


never regret thy fall

by mhorríghan (na_scathach), na_scathach



Series: 𝘰𝘩, 𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘳𝘶𝘴 [1]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, But also! Mystery, Canonical Character Death, Child Murder, Dead Leo Valdez, Dreams, Exploration of Trauma and how Death affects people, F/F, Gay yearning, Gen, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Past Child Abuse, Past Relationship(s), Past Sexual Abuse, Prophecy, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Wish Fulfillment, also don't expect accurate characterization. i'm a bad writer and i'm just havin some fun over here, and a road trip, btw im pissing in canon's mouth because i do what i want
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-12
Updated: 2020-02-19
Packaged: 2021-04-22 22:54:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 25,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22219828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/na_scathach/pseuds/mhorr%C3%ADghan, https://archiveofourown.org/users/na_scathach/pseuds/na_scathach
Summary: Nico was happy enough to let himself fade into the background, with no more quests and no more prophecies. He'd graduate, move out of Camp and just become another story they tell around the Campfire. Fade into obscurity and myth.But his plans never go smoothly, and Fate seems to have one last Quest for him before he can disappear. And that quest comes in the form of a half spoken prophecy from their on-the fritz oracleMost of the gods are MIA, demigods are sick and Cabin 9 has gone for a Nap. Nico's got enough physical and social problems to make himself dizzy, and his new quest mates are all horny, depressed, vaguely-suicidal 20-somethings on a quest to find a dead kid while his spirit takes up the hobby of both haunting and annoying Nico into falling in love with him.(Or: Nico, Piper, Percy and Reyna go on a road-trip to probably resurrect Leo Valdez and figure out why all children of hephaestus are in shut-down mode. And against Nico's wishes, there is way too much emotion involved in this quest)
Relationships: Hephaestus & Leo Valdez, Hephaestus/Esperanza Valdez, Jason Grace & Leo Valdez, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Nico di Angelo/Leo Valdez, Piper McLean & Leo Valdez, Piper McLean/Reyna Avila Ramírez-Arellano, Rachel Elizabeth Dare/Drew Tanaka
Series: 𝘰𝘩, 𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘳𝘶𝘴 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1599472
Comments: 30
Kudos: 111





	1. shane that's a coma (sounds festive)

**Author's Note:**

> hewwo everyone. i dont know what this is, but i want to do it. i've written ahead about 5 chapters, so expect semi-regular updates on Fridays. 
> 
> to the people who've read my previous works, im sorry. to those still waiting for them to update, why? but seriously, ive...uh..changed a lot since starting most of those stories, and i'll only be continuing at most Pramantha. thanks for the support but im simply not vibin' with em, y'know?
> 
> but anyways, on a better note. im in a good place mentally and im super-excited about this. so i'll see how long that lasts.
> 
> also, some quick warnings regarding the story in general: there will be discussions of child abuse, child murder, discussions of underaged sex/drinking and drug-use so if that potentially triggers or upsets you, I'd say give this one a miss. there will be no hard feelings and I'd prefer if you keep your mental wellbeing above some fanfiction. right now, it's pretty tame, but those topics and some others will be coming up later in the story. and don't worry, i will be putting warnings in front of each chapter if they contain heavy/triggering material.
> 
> EDIT: sorry for the formatting error in the middle there :(. its fixed now but sorry about it anyway

**CHAPTER I;**

**?? ???????, ??? ????** ** _/ _ ** **???? ???? ???? ????, ???????: ??** ** _/_ ** **??** ** _/_ ** **??**

  
  


_ they are…...floating is the best way to describe it, they suppose. _

_ in this infinitely swirling vortex, the slow twist of invisible waves softly tugging them away and back from everything and into nothing, or maybe it's the opposite and they've just forgotten, their mind adrift in this space of everything and nothingness. they're forgetting a lot of things but they know they're a thing or will be a Thing- _

_ but. _   
  


_ after an _

_ unc0un74bl3 _

_ and _

_ un _

_ trace _

_ able _

_ amount of time their breath hitches and their _

_ ~topsy-turvy~ _

_ self turns _

_ inwards _

_ like a flower blooming _

_ sdrawkcab _

_ because they've been thinking wrong because _ ** _they_ ** _ were- _

_ Leo. _

_ (!!!!!!) _

_ oh, so he’s dead. _

_ his name is (was?) Leo Valdez and he is dead and alone and not onboard with this particular afterlife. _

_ he wonders for a moment, what his dead body looks like so he tries to look at himself but he is not corporeal and he doesn’t really have eyes so he's really just running with the theory he has a body and isn't some kind of strange vapor-gas-thing. that would probably be horrific, or maybe it wouldn’t be, who is he to judge. he’s sure being vapor wouldn’t be all bad. _

_ he wonders where he is. _

_ he doesn’t think this is the Underworld. maybe it’s Hell. _

_ there is very little fire and brimstone. no freezing cold and creatures made from sin. he can’t smell sulfur and he can’t hear the screams of the damned. _

_ he entertains the thought of heaven. _

_ he doesn’t entertain it for long. _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ where is he? _

_ it takes him a moment to realize he’s screaming. _

_ his mouth burns with acid and blood, his skin boiling and his skeleton rotting, his eyes white and unseeing. he’s burning and drowning, his heart is still in his chest no matter how hard he listens for its drum. all he is has been reduced to panic. the festering, bubbling panic he’s unable to control or reason with. _

** _where is he?_ **

_ his wings burn. _

_ he continues to scream, and no one listens. _

* * *

_   
  
  
_

**Camp Half-Blood, Long Island, NY: 18/12/13**

_   
  
_

Nico wakes up to screaming. 

This wailing,_ oh my gods where is my arm _ kind of screaming. Which isn’t uncommon for the med bay, since demigods have been lopping off limbs and other extremities since the first time a god thought it'd be a swell idea to go talk to those funny-looking ants below them. 

Nico, thankfully, doesn’t have to deal with this specific incident because he’s holed up in the Supply Closet pretending to sleep on the orders of his Ex. Which would normally be a weird statement if he was anything other than the progeny of a mythical god. Or a TV-doctor on some telenovela. But, surprisingly, the line between those two is worryingly thin. 

He can barely hear the screaming now, and since he didn’t feel any soul leaving their body in his immediate vicinity, he assumes Will or any of the other kids in the med-bay knocked the screaming-person out. 

He shuffles on his makeshift bed and stares at the wall. 

The wall is white and cracked and peeling, showing concrete walls and previous layers of paint underneath. The white is harsh and clinical in artificial light, and Nico breathes out a heavy sigh. 

He gives up on sleeping and sits upright. The ‘Supply-closet’ which looks just like its namesake on the outside, looks more like those on-call rooms you’d find in actual hospitals. Bunk-beds with un-done blankets, thrown haphazardly around, like the people getting out of them were always in a rush somewhere. 

Or they look like what Nico has seen when Piper forced him to binge-watch Grey’s Anatomy with her while she was still holed up in the Aphrodite Cabin recovering.

He drags a hand across his face and digs the heel of his palms into his eye sockets and pulls himself into a sitting position on the rickety bed. He pulls his knees against his chest and rests his head on them, being extra mindful of how low the underside of the other bed of this bunk bed is to his head. 

If Nico wasn't a regular visitor, he'd assume this is what Charon's waiting room looked like. Cold and rickety furniture with harsh, unforgiving lighting. Nico himself stands in stark contrast from the mint green and white and light greys of the Supply Closet, wearing dark clothing, his crows-nest of inky black hair droops into his eyes again, soft against the skin of his forehead. 

He tucks his head between his knees, the dark denim of his jeans chafing against the skin of his face. He can also feel the beginning of a headache blooming behind his eyes and he wants nothing more than to find some unicorn draught and pass out for 72 hours. But if he does that again Hazel will actually kill him this time instead of just threatening to do it. Which, speaking of, would probably be the nicest way to die. 

Again, speaking of dying, he should probably get back to helping his Ex save the life of whatever dumbass 14-year-old decided today would be the day Clarisse La Rue would finally be defeated. Nico has a strong feeling that that day will never come and Nico will be forever stuck dragging stupid kids back from being eternally hand-less.

“Fuck,” he breathes, scraping his hair back from where it’s falling into his eyes.

One long, slow, breath, hold it, out, _ slowly. _ Gods, these migraines were getting worse. The cold stabbing, like an icicle in his brain, burning his eyes and burrowing into his scalp, was starting to get less _ ‘oh I need to sleep’ _ and more like ‘ _ I think I have brain cancer’. _

He pushes himself out of the bed, his eyes still heavy with sleep but he feels too keyed up to try and rest again, not with the freezing cold pain stinging his brain and his bones. So, he stumbles upwards, old scars tingling as he stretches and he walks right out the door, into the breach. 

It’s calmer than an hour or two ago, but there are still people moaning and twisting on beds, with injury or fever and medics rushing about the huge room. He spots the previously-screaming child, with an exasperated Apollo Kid- Alice? She’s new, only 13 or 14, but she’s already got that kind of world-weariness that comes with being a demi-god written all over her freckled face. 

He smiles at her, or at least his own approximation of a smile. She smiles back, freckled cheeks dimpling and growing, but her blue eyes have thumb-print bruises under them, deep and purple. 

“Sleep well, Nico?” Will calls out (sarcastically, of course) over his shoulder, from where he’s working on a Camper’s head-stitches on one of the many unoccupied beds. The Camper bites their lip as Will threads the needle through their skin. Nico doesn’t bother with a reply, instead, he moves into Will’s line of sight, shrugging his shoulders. 

“Migraines,” he says, carefully casual, after a few minutes of tense silence and it being clear Will won’t let him go without an answer. 

But he can still feel Will’s blue eyes on the side of his head for a second or two, an unrelenting cerulean, but before focusing back at his task, threading the needle through bloody, purple-tinged skin, veins in stark contrast. 

“Are you taking your pills? At least trying to sleep? Drinking fluids?” Will checks-off, over the whimper of the Camper, continuing after he gives him a consoling pat on the shoulder. “They’ll just get worse the longer you go around treating your body like shit” and he says that with a no-nonsense cadence and Nico squashes that flare of anger. Will is looking out for him. He shouldn’t want to wring his neck just because he’d like Nico to live longer than 27. But they can’t voice an argument in the middle of the Infirmary. 

Not again, anyways. 

Nico rolls his eyes in lieu of an actual answer. Will finishes up on the sweating Camper, putting away his bloody instruments and stripping off his gloves. They have a Head-Counselor meeting in 10 minutes and Nico hates being late to those things, mostly because Dionysus usually uses you as his official point of mockery for the entire week if you show up after him.

“Well, you’re all set,” Will says softly to the Camper, patting their hand gently, “just be careful next time you want to challenge someone to a Lava-Wall climbing competition while you’re still nursing a hangover, okay?”

The Camper whimpers and lies back down on the bed. They look a solid 15, so Will will probably tell their Head Counselor, just in case it’s a problem. 

The older, more mature Campers had to crack-down on underage drinking and the taking of ‘_ substances’ _after one too many high-as-fuck demigods had gotten lost in the Forest. 

Then there were the Bunker 9 parties, held in conjunction with Cabin 9 kids, Hermes kids, and the new Dionysius kids, using their underground tunnels and rooms to sneak people around for smuggling and parties. Chiron didn’t know about them, but Will promised to snitch if people kept coming to his Cabin at three in the morning with alcohol poisoning and overdose galore. 

The most prominent incident in Nico’s mind being the Moth Incident.

Nico doesn't think he'll ever be able to forget the Moth Incident. 

"Well," Will groans, stretching his long, tanned arms above his head, "c'mon, Nico. We've got a meeting to survive"

Nico, somehow, becomes even more exhausted at the mention of an hour-long meeting, in the mildly cold Big House and a few dozen grumpy demigods, arguing over what they should do for the 21st or what Head Counselors would be staying after Christmas. Maybe another quest would be issued, maybe not. But Nico would not be involved. 

Nico Di Angelo is 17 years old, nearly 18 and that means he’s nigh _ ancient _for a child of the Big Three, so he hasn’t gone on many quests since a year or two ago, and even then, quests have gone back to being rare. Maybe two or three in a year if they’re particularly busy, and no quest since the Quest to Athens has been in any way shape or form threatening to their existence as demigods. No Big Prophecies. No Big Bads. 

It’s quiet. 

He pushes back the pulsing migraine at the center of his brain. It's deadly cold and piercing, but Nico's grown accustomed to them. He has things to do. People to advise, a life to think about, school to despise and monsters to kill. 

He follows Will, through the snow and the freezing air, shoes crunching on snow and stiff grass, the sky above grey and only letting in a faint, sickly yellow glow from the sun, his breath clouding out from his lips and his cheeks already tinged pink.

It takes him a minute to realize he can still, faintly, hear the screaming.

* * *

**Camp Half-Blood, Long Island, NY: 18/12/13**

3 years feel like such a long time in theory. 

_ So _much can happen in three years. 36 months. 157 weeks. 1,095 days. 26,280 hours. 1,576,800 minutes. 94,608,000 seconds. 

Shane has counted nearly every second since his brother died. 

Every beat, tick, thrum. He's counted it. He's counted the breathes he wouldn't take. He's counted the stars in the sky he would never see. 

Cabin 9's eternal curse. 

Their best would always end up dying for some greater cause. The Cabin 9 kids with the most potential, their leaders, burned away by some eternal curse. No child of Hephaestus was ever the hero in the old stories. Always the supporting character, the engineer in the background. They built the weapons used to kill gods, and never got the same praise as the person who swung it. 

And when one of their own ended up getting the main role, when a child of Hephaestus ended up being a _ child of prophecy, _he still died. He still had to give up so much for others. 

Shane thought his brother was the cause of the curse when he first found out about his fire. Most Hephaestus kids had learned a healthy fear of fire. Yes, it could be used to create weapons and machines, but it burned and hurt. It was a tool, like a knife or a hammer. Capable of good or bad, depending on the wielder. But when the past wielders of Dad’s Fire were such stand-up people like Thomas Farriner, arsonist of London or Níamh Ní Mhurchú, who started the Chicago fire, the Gift was seen as a curse more than a blessing. 

But he was different. Awkward and kind, covered by a mask of joking indifference. His Fire meant _ hope _ for them. They had a leader again, who wanted to make them _ seen. _ For once, they weren’t just the sword-makers and bomb-builders, but the people the prophecy _ hinged _on. They were the people building the Argo ii. 

For 6 months, they all felt whole. Charlie’s empty space would always feel like a shadow over them all, but their fire-wielding brother helped them focus on something different. He gave them a purpose. No matter how hard he tried to tell them he wasn’t fit for the position of Counselor, they all knew he’d grow into it. 

He gave Harley a role-model, he gave Nyssa a break to be a teenager, he gave Jake another chance, he gave Hedy someone to beat, he gave Luchtaine inspiration, he gave Lancia a chance to prove herself. 

He gave Shane a brother. 

Shane looked up to him. Not physically, of course, despite him being two years older than Shane, he still stood an inch taller. He looked up to him because he made him think that what Shane did had importance. That just because he didn’t have fancy powers or amazing swordsman-ship didn’t mean he wasn’t just as powerful as other demigods. 

Because, despite his brother’s fire, his real power came from his intelligence. From the fact he could build and create. Not just because he was Dad’s favorite. 

He was funny too. He was easy-going but driven. A stark difference to most of them. He brought Shane out of his shell with quick jokes and easy grins, teaching him and hanging out with him, making him play his stupid hacked Mario game on the ‘64. He gave Shane his first cigarette, with a stern lesson on why he shouldn’t smoke after Shane coughed up a lung. He listened when Shane would ramble on about the newest Marvel release, despite his own heart lying with DC, joking with him and letting himself be taught (with only a little bit of bitching) when Shane noticed he was doing something wrong. 

And then he went off the stop Gaia. And he did. He killed a _ god _. He stopped a war and saved the world

But he died. 

Shane had to help sew his funeral shroud after they fished his body out of the Atlantic. 

It turns out, his brother could burn, just not while he was alive.

His fingers bled for weeks after, from the nicks of the needle. He still remembers the gold and red thread, woven together with black string. A gold dragon emblazoned on the front curled around Cabin 9’s twin hammers.

The new kids always had questions about him and it usually fell to Shane to answer them. Harley got too...emotional when their brother was brought up and Luchtaine still hasn’t warmed up to the newer kids. Lancia helps, sometimes, but the newer kids, like Nikola, only had the faintest grasp of sign-language and that made communicating large pieces of information difficult. 

_ What was he like? _ Annoying. Caring. Hyperactive. Intelligent. The best. _ Would he have liked me? _ He would’ve thought you were the shit. _ Why did he get fire powers and I don’t? _Fate. Now shut up and eat your greens, Emma. 

The ping-pong table is smooth under his tanned fingers, still baring the white pinpricks from the sewing needle. Green against honey-brown. He taps out a message to no one, fingers drumming his brother’s old beat against the table as Malcolm rambles on about something. Probably about the Soltice. It’s only a few days away and they’ve got _ nothing _planned

Shane casts murky grey eyes over the assembled crowd of Head Counselors, packed into corners and hanging on plastic chairs, only half-listening to the meeting. Most of the Head Counselors now are only barely old enough to remember the Gigantomachy, never mind the Battle of New York. 

Hades, _ Shane _ wasn’t even around for the Battle of New York. He was kept at Camp, judged too young to throw away his life in the streets of New York. He has faint memories, but that’s it. His memories of Charlie are hazy and undefined, under a light film of age. 

It hurts to think that he's already forgotten his voice. He’s forgotten the whiteness of his teeth against his skin, forgotten the feel of his hand ruffling through his hair, forgotten the _ exact _ details of his face.

It hurts, even more, to think he's starting to forget Leo's. Starting to forget the way he smiled and starting to forget the way his accent got thicker when he got tired, starring to-

He forces himself to stop. He doesn’t deserve to be shoved back into another little hole of misery. 

He sighs, and Micah catches his eye from where they're sitting across from him. Their mix-matched gold and silver eyes are bored and tired but the question is clear enough. 

He rolls his eyes and gives them a small grin, watching the child of Hecate smile warmly back at him. He lets himself be worried about the bags under Micah's eyes, but only for a second before he focuses back on the table. 

His cheeks feel hot, but he focuses back on Malcolm’s heavy drone. It’s times like this where he half-whishes he was a Cabin Counselor during one of the Wars. If there was a War he wouldn’t have to think about Winter Soltice plans because he’d be too busy either dying or trying to kill something older than his entire family line. 

Miriam, the Hermes Head-Counselor, clears her throat beside Shane and he turns his head slightly to watch her, his brain under a heavy layer of boredom. 

"Look, Mal, we're good. Everyone is bored and tired, and we're running at half-capacity. We'll talk about the trip to New Rome later, but right now I propose a recess. All in favor?" she near _ begs, _a pained smile on her pale face. 

There's a chorus of '_ fuck yeah' _ s and Shane hides a smile in his hands. Chiron throws them a tired look, but he doesn't scold them for their language. Which he usually does, but there’s a faint trace of excitement in the air. Winter Solstice is always a fun time, and since Lancia is his only sibling who _ isn’t _a year-rounder, he’ll be spending Greek Christmas with most of his family. 

Everyone shifts and starts to move, talking amongst themselves and Shane walks over to Micah, taking in their slumped shoulders and a tired, tight smile. Their deep, dark brown skin is paler, less full of life and Shane wants to wrap them up in a warm blanket and make them sleep until the end of the worl. 

Shane hopes he's still not blushing

“Hey,” they say, blinking up at Shane from their spot on the rickety plastic chair. They’ve pulled their knees up to their chest, resting their chin on knees left bare by ripped, green-and-black patterned pants. 

“You good?” he asks, clenching his hands into fists to stop himself from reaching _ out- _

They smile, a lazy, half-assed thing, but it still sparks something in the middle of Shane’s chest. Something sharp and hot, like a knife still in the process of being made. “I’m good- just, tired, I guess,” they say, their voice small but perfectly clear in the quiet clamor of the Game Room. 

“You should get me to read out my physics homework again. That seems to make you real tired,” and Micah snorts, rolling their eyes like they’re annoyed at him. Shane knows it’s more _ fondness _ than any actual annoyance. Or, at least Shane _ hopes _it’s fondness. 

“It happened _ once, _ Shay. You can stop bringing up every 10 minutes, and, I don’t know, come up with some _ new _ways to be an annoyance,” they grin, their spark returning to their eyes like fireworks in a night sky, “Come on, Faber, bring in some originality. Spice it up”

Shane laughs as he makes a conscious effort to not blush. 

Micah’s eyes are so _ hypnotic- _

His cheeks are warm, he can feel it, like a brand under his skin_ , _but the more he thinks about the blush and Micah the harder he blushes and it’s just a cycle of blushing and self-hatred. 

He’s had a crush on Micah Baineaux since he was 9 years old. He’s had a crush on Micah since their name wasn’t even Micah and he thinks that he’ll continue to have a crush on them until the end of time. Always pinning from afar. 

He starts praying for something or someone to save him from the actual trainwreck of his social skills. Why couldn’t he be the child of the _ charismatic _blacksmith god?. 

The door to the Big House bangs open and Rachel Dare comes running in, snow dropping on wild, red curls. She’s breathing heavy, hands fisted above her heart and her green eyes wild and shining. Unnaturally shiny, actually. 

Thank the gods for Rachel Dare, he thinks faintly as the room turns it’s quiet attention to the woman. Pale skin tinted red with exertion and a bush of red hair falling in front of her face. Her eyes are wild and her hands are fisted in front of her heart. 

Shane didn’t even know she was _ here. _Christ, he hopes Tanaka isn’t here. 

“Hey, Rach, what’s-” starts Will, but he’s cut off by Rachel pitching forward, feet stumbling over one another and the whole room surges forward, like they were all going to catch her. 

Dionysus is playing with an unopened bottle of Merlot a few feet away from Shane, but he catches the slight raise of his dark, bushy eyebrow. Arching in a quiet surprise. _ Surprise. _ Gods don’t usually get fucking _ surprised. _

Snow starts to fall heavily outside. The windows rattle slightly in their frames, as the wind begins to howl. 

“Micah, I-” he says, trying to tell them he thinks something is _ happening. _It feels like a pit in his chest, opening and bottomless and hungry, so fucking hungry. 

“Prophecy,” Rachel gasps into Will’s chest, her mound of hair the only part of her Shane could see. He can barely hear her over the sound of blood rushing in his ears, the echoing drumbeat of his own heart beating a tattoo against his ribcage. 

Then, the noise cuts off. Unnaturally. They all freeze, their breath stilled as Rachel throws her head back. All the light in the room seems to float towards her. The air stills. There is no oxygen. No atmosphere here, not anymore. There is the room and their floating bodies, lost in a vacuum. Shane can’t even hear his breathing over the roar in his ears. 

“No-” someone gasps but their words have no power. He thinks it might be him. 

His heart is beating so hard that it hurts. Fuck, it hurts so much. It crashes against his eardrums and up against his ribs like his heart is trying to dig itself out of his body by any means necessary. 

_ Tha-thud _

_ Tha-thud _

_ Tha-thud _

_ where is he? _

_ Tha-thud _

_ Tha-thud _

_ Tha-thud _

_ Tha-thud _

_ Tha-thud _

_ Tha-thud _

The air is thin. Rachel is using it all up. Her eyes flicker. And they flicker again. Her skin glows but she stays silent. Her eyes are closed but her eyelids shine like a verdure lighthouse. Light trails of green smoke escape between closed lips, but they _ stay _closed. 

It doesn’t work like this. 

“Something’s _ wrong,” _Micah says, rough and commanding, their eyes swimming with barely restrained magic. “It feels wrong- oh gods-”

Shane clamps down on their wrist before they can push forward. He pulls them back. They can’t leave him. Rachel starts to float. Her body floats up until she’s lying on air, back slightly arched and arms spread. The windows shake so hard Shane thinks that they might break. When did it get so dark?

Shane feels like he’s going to get sick. 

Someone_ does _ get sick. It’s Will. Will Solace. 

They all watch, paralyzed. They should be _ doing _something, helping her, fixing her!-

_ Everything can be fixed, Shay. You just gotta try hard enough _

Shane has never felt this sick before. His head thunders and all his worse memories are at the forefront of his mind. Every death he’s witnessed, the bloody chaos of the Battle with the Romans, his Dad’s death, finding Leo’s body-

_ Everything can be- _

Shane feels his stomach churn. This is a perversion. Something that goes against nature. This is turning something sacred into something disgusting. Something has _ trapped _ the Oracle. Something is _ killing _the Oracle. The Oracle needs help, she needs help, something is forcing her back. She must not be forced back. 

Bile is stinging Shane’s throat. Blood pours out of his nose while he stands, transfixed, staring at Rachel, the chains chafing against his skin 

Rachel drops, her body dropping to the floor with a _ thud _ and the spell is shut off. Her influence is gone. 

Shane collapses onto his hands, bile forcing its way up and out onto the wood, stinging his chest and throat, blood from his nose mixing with his tears and other fluid. He coughs and coughs, his eyes stinging. A cool hand rubs his back. He does that for he doesn’t know how long. Time loses all meaning as he heaves, his stomach clenching in pain as his head burns with a migraine.

Eventually, Shane spits and sits back, letting someone pick him up. Which is strange. Not many people can pick Shane up. Shane is very large. What is happening to Shane?

“Shhh,” Micah says into his hair, “Shhh, Shay, it’s okay, you’re okay, shhh, I’ve got you-”

“Micah,” he croaks, digging his fingers into Micah’s shoulders. “What-”

Shane’s eyes are closed. Why are they closed?. 

He opens them. 

His face is tucked into Micah’s neck, breathing in their scent of fresh dirt and honey, counting their breaths. He’s on Micah’s lap, he realizes, quite suddenly, while Micah has pressed themselves back against the wall, sitting with their legs splayed. 

He turns his head to look at the carnage. Others are passed out, while others are still throwing up, held in the arms of those who recovered quicker. Some looked completely unaffected, while others, like Will, Kayla, and Miriam look like what Shane feels like. 

“What,” he tries again, his mind scattered to the four winds. He can’t connect everything, not yet, and his head burns. 

“Rachel got...weird and suddenly we were all sick, darling, but it’s okay now,” Micah soothes, their voice shaky and unsure. 

“Fuck!” someone shouts and the noise dims, leaving way for the shout. Shane shifts around until he’s just sitting on Micah’s lap, their chin hooked over Shane’s broad shoulder. 

If the son of Hephaestus was in his right mind, he would’ve been blushing and bumbling so hard he would’ve ceased to function, but his mind is slow, covered in soft honey and dark ink. He feels numb. He feels empty-

Rachel, their Oracle, is being supported by Will and Amanda, her pale skin nearly _ grey _as she struggles to stay upright. Even from where Shane is hidden, he can see the sweat beading on her face. 

"Fuck,” she says again, quieter this time. 

“Rachel,” Micah begins, but Rachel beats them to it. 

“I think I just got blocked out. I knew Delphi was going to say something _ big, _ but it was like she got...I don’t know- _ yanked _ out of me at the last second, god, _ fuck,” _

Will nods to his second in command as he helps Rachel up the stairs to one of the private rooms and Kayla starts going over everyone with careful eyes, despite the sheen of sweat on her face. “Shane, love, I’ve gotta go help,” Micah whispers gently, their hands soft, their eyes soft, their voice soft soft soft. 

“M‘kay,” he mutters and suddenly, he’s very, very tired. So tired. He should sleep. Right here, in Micah’s arms. They’d keep him safe, just while he sleeps. 

Blood drips from his nose and onto his mouth. His eyes start stinging again. They feel wet. 

He hates the taste of blood. 

“Shane,” Micah says, furious and terrified all of a sudden, their hands soft on his face, “Shane open your eyes! Stay awake, Shane! C’mon, seriously, don’t-”

He _ must _sleep. It’s the only way. He wants to tell Micah this. He wants to tell Micah a lot of things. Like how gorgeous he thinks they are. They’re so pretty. So, so fucking brilliant. 

He wants-

His eyes slip firmly closed. And he falls asleep. 

  
  



	2. nico dreams about [REDACTED]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~what the fuck am i doing~

**CHAPTER II; **

**Camp Half-Blood, Long Island, NY: 19/12/13**

Nico has never seen anything like it. 

8 bodies all lie silent on their beds in Cabin 9.

They _are _breathing_, _thank the gods. Their chests move, their pulses beat and Nico feels like a reaper, standing beside the doorway, arms crossed over his chest. He feels like an intruder. 

Cabin 9 is large but not as large as Ares or Hermes or Aphrodite. The walls are painted a dark, nighttime blue, with schematics and whiteboards covering most of the free wall space. It feels completely different from his Cabin

Not to mention, the beds, apparently, all have secret compartments, which they only discovered when they realized that Luchtaine Walsh and his bed were missing and Malcolm found the emergency lever, to everyone's shock and surprise. 

Of course, the emergency level did pull up the bed so quickly that Luchtiane went ragdoll flying up in the air for a few seconds, but Will assured there was no damage. Probably. 

Nico begins to tap out some old beat on his bicep, some pop tune he heard as he watches over the sleeping Hephaestus kids. 

It feels _wrong. _

Some deep, dark pit in his stomach gnaws at his nerves, making his breathing sharp and shallow. Adrenaline pumps through him even though he's standing still. He feels like he should be _doing _something, but he doesn’t think his powers will be of much help here, not with his Father going suddenly AWOL. 

He even tried to call _ Persephone, _that’s how desperate he is. But she didn’t pick up either, and he wants to put off going to the Palace for as long as possible. 

He knows something is terribly, terribly wrong. It tastes like sour milk and iron at the back of his throat as he feels for Shane Faber’s thread. It’s alive, but- _ not. _The life is there but there is nothing else. 

They all may not be dead, but they’re not alive, either. 

_ Shit. _

Robin, a daughter of Hebe is running her hands up and down Harley Davidson’s prone body, golden light shining out from her pink palms. Her face is screwed up in concentration as she tries to push life back into him, but he stays still as death. 

“It’s not working,” she relents, breathing heavily as she steps away from Harley, her golden light disappearing and plunging the Cabin back into dim, grey light. 

The Curse of Cabin 9. 

The snow continues to rush down outside. 

It’s real, isn’t it? Charlie, the curse, the destruction of Festus and The Argo, the death of-

It’s not a coincidence. Which means something has it out for Hephaestus and his children. But _what? _Hephaestus isn’t exactly a controversial god, nor are his children. The Blacksmiths and Weaponsmiths, who built their weapons of war and didn’t look for the glory. 

“It’s fine, Robin. You tried your best,” he sighs, pushing off his place on the wall to pat Robin on the shoulder awkwardly. He’s not sure what to say and it shows. She nods, thick dreads bouncing with the movement as her eyes darken in exhaustion, her shoulders slumping. 

“Thank you-,” and she pauses, shifting on her feet and ducks her eyes away from Nico’s, “...Nico,” her voice wavy and unsure. 

He nods and steps aside, watching her trudge to the door and crack it open, just enough to see outside. 

The snow is thick and heavy, pilling up in banks and turning Camp into a mottle of white and grey and brown. Robin shakes her head once again and sighs as she looks out the door, but before she goes, she turns, just slightly and gives one last look to the bodies on the beds. Small, quiet brown eyes look back, past Nico and her exhaustion doubles, like she’s just taken on a physical load. 

“It’s unfair,” she whispers, “It’s really, really unfair,” and it counts to something about their lives if Nico can make _many _guesses as to what she’s referring to. 

She sighs, again, when Nico awkwardly stays quiet. Her shoulders slump and her eyes are lost in a heavy, misty fog. 

“Goodnight, Nico,” and she’s gone, leaving Nico with the not-dead bodies and the screaming quiet of Cabin 9. 

He hates it. He hates silence and emptiness where it shouldn’t be. It makes the hair on his arms stick up in fear and revulsion, but he volunteered to help keep watch, and Nico keeps his promises. Even if he hates them. _ Especially _if he hates them. 

The air tastes like oil and death and Nico wants nothing more than to go for a shower to scald his skin off. His brain is too cold and his skin is too hot and he hates it, _fuck. _

His head is in his hands when he realized he’s missed his meds. Again. Godsdamnit. Now he’ll have to try and deal with a crippling migraine on top of these not-corpses and their moving chests. 

“Someone up there hates me,” he mumbles to no-one, letting his head fall into his arms as he curls around himself, the familiar ice sinking into his skull as the space between his eyes_ throb. _Shit, they’ve always hurt, but never this bad. 

He shivers, clamping down on his swirling nausea and sits in the corner furthest away from all the beds, wrapping his arms around himself. He’ll just..rest his eyes for a bit. He’ll stay awake, he swears, but it’s not like they’re going anywhere. He’ll listen. He swears-

He sleeps. 

And he dreams. 

  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  


**-.. . .- - .... / ...- .- .-.. .-.. . -.--**

_ he dreams, but it’s not like his usual dreams. there is no clear visions or snippets of conversations he shouldn’t be listening to. Clovis is far away in this state and Nico is _ ** _not _ ** _in Control. _

_ he sees a house. three stories and wedged between chainmail fences and another house, it’s twin. painted the palest blue, with white trimmings, long stained with brown and black from rain and mold. the wood panel exterior is rotting and the windows are broken. glass, like scattered diamonds on the wild grass of the front yard. _

_ the grass is grey and dying, there are random, dug-up holes in the ground. _

_ a sign creaks in the wind. _

_ ‘The Adrianna de Raiz-’ _

_ it shifts, wildly, like Nico’s on a rollercoaster he never knew that he got on. the axis spins and his mind floats in a vacuum for a few moments, until he’s pulled back. images flit by him like he’s watching this from the platform and they’re on a speeding subway, racing over tracks and into a dark tunnel, brushing against him. _

_ it’s a man, squirming and screaming on a rock. _

_ it’s Olympus. the gods are arguing, but it’s all greek to Nico. their eyes glowing and lips burning as they scream at each other. _

_ it’s a figure’s back. _

_ it’s- _

_ it’s a person. a person he’s started to forget. their hair is just as wild, untamable and chaotic and soft as ever. copper eyes and deep bronze skin. _

_ the other person is lying in a room. just a room, with light brown wood floors and white walls, stained by time and other suspicious substances. there’s no furniture, save for a single mattress pressed against one wall, covered in thousands of blankets. there’s a window, leading to a fire-escape, wide open, letting in a soft summer breeze, tainted with the smells and sounds of the city below. The screech of a car, muddled voices, soft clangs, and distant sirens. the smell of hot concrete and fast-food drifting in slowly. _

_ but in this room, the only sound is the boy’s soft and even breathing. the only smell is this person and the faint scent of nicotine smoke. time is still here, soft white dust particles dancing in the summer dusk. _

_ the copper boy turns his head, pillowed by his arms on that small mattress. he blinks, not surprised, not in the slightest. like he’s been expecting Nico, and he’s disappointed he’s late. _

_ and he furrows his brow and his lips pull down at the edges like he’s frustrated with Nico. like he’s getting angry at him and he opens his mouth and- _

_ “-.....-” _

  
  
  
  


.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.  
  


* * *

**Camp Half-Blood, Long Island, NY: 20/12/13**

Nico startles awake and he can’t remember why. Which is becoming increasingly common. Dreams he can’t remember, save for the hot, tight feeling of guilt and grief lying in the center of his chest. 

His breath comes in heavy pants, dampening the skin of his forearms with hot breath. His mind is in free-fall, but he grips onto the feeling of the soft mattress against his back. A solid thing, anchoring himself as he swallows heavily, throat working as he runs his tongue over dry lips-

mattress. 

He shoots up, blinking the room into focus through sleep and moisture. It’s his room in Cabin 13. He’s fine. Breathe. He rubs a calloused palm over his eyes and sleep-warm skin. Breathe. It’s dark out, night leaking in through a window and his heart lurches a bit, but the majority of the magic lamps are turned on, bathing the room in faded yellow. 

_ Breathe. _

It’s, in his opinion, much nicer than Cabin 13’s original, vampiric design. Which, don’t get Nico wrong, he loves gothic architecture and that whole vampire aesthetic, but he doesn’t love it enough to spend entire summers in it. And Will said dark-colored rooms made rooms smaller. 

And, for obvious reasons, Nico’s not exactly a fan of small, enclosed spaces. 

He falls back against the pillows and groans. He must’ve fallen asleep in Cabin 9, and judging by his removed shoes and the way his body is tucked into the blankets, Will probably brought him back. Which then makes him angry, then sad, then angry again, finally settling on ‘_ pit-in-his-chest-that-makes-him-feel-empty’. _

Cabin 13, after Hazel had viciously attacked it with her Pinterest board, was now painted a vaguely-white color, with black floorboards and soft, normal beds. And enough lights to turn Cabin 13 into a miniature IKEA. Fairy-lights, lamps, small, ever-burning green flames, they had it all. 

A Shrine to his Father sits at the back, simple and dark, shadowed but not neglected. A pomegranate, some ambrosia and a burning candle of greek fire. 

Hazel, of course, went crazy with the walls. Little painted black skeletons walked the bottom of the walls in an orderly fashion, while crows and ravens flew above, a crescent moon overtaking the sky. The ceiling had little cut-out paper skeleton horses and cats. 

It looked like an aesthetic Pinterest board of an over-excited 15-year-old that was decorating for Halloween. 

Nico still didn’t know if it revolted him or if he loved it. But Hazel loved it, and that was all Nico cared about. 

He breathes in the smell of home. Eucalyptus with fresh, clean dirt and the faint smell of whatever the harpies wash the sheets with. The panic between his veins calms, and he’s Nico again. Undeniably, truly Nico. His soul anchors to the moment, to the light and he’s _fine. _

He drags himself out of the warm, heavy comforter and into the cold air. He’s still wearing the clothes he was wearing in the morning, jeans and a plain shirt. He can’t go back to sleep. Not now, while he’s still...anxious? From his dreams. It’s like he’s waiting for something or someone, for him to do something, but there is nothing. He feels lost, so he cracks his spine, twisting his aching muscles as he rises, the need to do _something _pacing around in his ribcage like a lion at a zoo. 

He knees at his Father’s shrine, for lack of a better thing to do. He’s not in the habit of praying to his Father, but Nico doesn’t know what to do, and something inside him needs to _fix this_. Maybe this time, it'll work. _Please_, _work_, his brain whispers frantically. 

The ancient greek comes to his tongue unconsciously. All demigods, greek ones anyway, pray in greek, even if they don’t know that they know greek. 

“Πατέρα, χρειάζομαι καθοδήγηση,” he whispers to the silence of the cabin, the greek fire casting sharp lines over his face. 

He isn’t really expecting an answer, but he isn’t expecting the- absence. His Father just- isn’t there and it’s almost terrifying. He felt this earlier too when he first tried to make contact and this- _disconnect_ is putting Nico on edge. 

Nico squeezes his eyes shut, knees digging into the hardwood floor and he whispers again. 

“Πατέρα, Άδη, σε _παρακαλώ_, χρειάζομαι καθοδήγηση”

The absence continues and Nico lets his clasped hands fall, desperately searching for even a scrap of his Father’s presence, but Nico is alone. 

Shit. Shit. Shit, shit, shit- this is bad. Very, very bad. Should he go to the underworld? _ Make _his Father talk? His head is spinning wildly as his knees ache, his head falling against the shrine. He doesn't want to go to the palace and Nico's not brave enough to admit that he's too afraid of what he'll find. 

“_Σε παρακαλώ_, απλά απάντησέ μου”

_ sihtxifsihtxifsihtxifsihtxifsihtxifsihtxifsihtxifsihtxif _

“Nico, what the hell are you doing,” and Nico’s clambering to his feet, a hand falling onto where his sword is meant to be, spinning towards the doorway, where _ Reyna _stands. She’s darker and taller than the last time they talked face-to-face, her braids reaching past the middle of her back now. But she looks younger. Her face softer, fewer stress lines crowding her sharp face. 

“Reyna,” he breathes, a small grin sneaking onto his lips, the panicked spell disappearing with her familiar dark eyes, “ I didn’t know-”

“Neither did I,” she sighs, letting herself in and collapsing on one of the spare beds, brushing past Nico and entering the Cabin like she’s arrived home. “But Praetor Zhang wanted a full report on what happened here and I was in the area, so I volunteered myself in the stead of sending people cross-country to do something I could easily do”

“Your sense of duty never ceases to amaze me. You’ll come here, but only if you’re investigating for Camp Jupiter, and not to see your best friend?”

“But Thalia’s in Virginia-”

She’s smirking, and Nico doesn’t stop himself from flipping her off. 

“Anyway, I was going to call, once I got settled in, but this call came first” she explains and Nico sits on the bed with her. She’s tired, that’s clear, but she’s not exhausted. It’s the kind of tired you get when someone wakes you in the middle of a good night’s sleep, not the kind of tired Nico’s more used to. She’s already half-asleep and Nico grins. 

“Aren’t you meant to be retired? Living out your golden years teaching snot-nosed brats how to fight? And pretending you’re not desperately in love with Piper? Wasn’t that the plan? I-_ ow,” _he yelps as Reyna pinches his calf. 

“Shut up, brat,” 

He frowns, his dark eyes flinty, “I’m serious, Reyna. You were Praetor for nearly 5 years. You need to-”

Reyna looks up at him. Exhausted. “Can we not tonight?” and it’s not an order but Nico would never deny her that. 

He swallows his words and nods, rubbing his face again. He’s not tired, he’s not awake- he doesn’t know what the Hades he is. He can’t go back to sleep. 

Not without some outside intervention, that is. 

“Get some sleep, Reyna,” he relents, standing up on weak knees as she toes her boots off, not even a slight protest coming from her. Gods, she must be tired. “I need to talk to Clovis about the-” Incident? Does it have a name yet? The Great Cabin 9 Nap of 2013? “-Hephaestus problem-thing”. 

“Isn’t it a bit late to be doing that? It’s 4 in the morning, Di Angelo. Don’t go shadow-traveling into people’s homes without permission before dawn. That’ll usually get you arrested for B&E” and she yawns in the middle of her sentence, snuggling under the blankets, undermining her serious frown and hard words. 

He kisses the crown of her head and wanders back to his bed, hidden in the dim shadows, away from Reyna’s bed. 

Nico may not be able to get help from his Father or the other gods, but he knows someone whose entire existence revolves around sleep and Nico thinks that’s how he’ll fix this. 

“Oh, don’t worry,” he says to an almost-sleeping Reyna, finding a vial of unicorn draught under his bed. It’s a special mixture, done by Amanda Bevin, a child of Dionysus. 14 years old and the best smuggler in Camp, aside from Farah Powers in Hermes. Unicorn Draught mixed with...stuff. ‘_Guaranteed to knock you the fuck out in a matter of seconds’ _was the tagline, and she was true to her word. Useless for a good time, but perfect for the Camp insomniacs and those dealing with dream-walking and its related magic. 

Of course, Bevin monitored all sales of her Unicorn Draught, and would only give so much out. She was already wary of selling it to Nico, telling him to ‘_ go get some actual help, you emo reject’ _first, but he promised her he’d only use it in emergencies. 

She told him to fuck off again, but then he promised her that he’d only use it for _this _specific purpose. And then she said yes. But just barely. 

“Neither of us are going to be awake for this meeting”

He lies back onto the mattress, gives a quick prayer to Dad, Hypnos and Morpheus, before he tips the small vial back, past his lips and into his throat. It tastes like sour-milk and the dreams of dead children. 

And like a bear-trap around his consciousness, it snaps shut, dragging Nico into darkness. 

* * *

**[REDACTED]**

Nico’s ability to talk to Hypnos children in his dreams has never been particularly strange. Sleep and Death are brothers of a different feather after all. 

Sleep is death just being a little bit shy. He can’t remember who said that. 

He walks through the misty not-place where he usually ends up nowadays, lethe-white smoke drifting around his calves and observing his feet from view. The white is endless, stretching into grey the further it goes, but it never stops. 

_ Clovis_, he calls out, his lips barely moving. _ Clovis, are you here? _

The white stays quiet, but Nico can wait. He stands, dark against the white. A shadow amongst clouds. 

_ Clovis_! he calls again. _ I know you’re asleep, can you answer me? _ and like a swift kick to the stomach, Clovis appears. 

_ Nico, awww man, I was havin this really cool dream about...this really nice beach. Really nice. But then the Kraken appeared and there was this guy fighting it and- _

_ Clovis. Stop. _

Clovis stops, and yawns, showing off milky-white teeth and pink gums. His soft, white-blond hair falls into lidden brown eyes, blinking slowly. _ Sorry, Nico_, he says, his voice slow and careful, like he’s still half-asleep. 

_ It’s fine, but I need you to tell me something_, and at this, Clovis perks up. Well as much as Clovis _can _perk up. His blinking becomes a little quicker and his face just a fraction less soft. 

_ Of course, man, what do you want to know? _

_ Have you been able to see if the Heph- _

_ No _

Nico blinks at Clovis’ hard dismissal, thrown off balance. _ No? They’re not dreaming, at all? _ He asks, moving closer to Clovis’ murky form. 

_ Yeah, it’s kinda weird, man. Like, I know they aren’t dead, but they _ **_feel_ ** _like it. It’s _ **_not_ ** _like what happened to Jason Grace, and it’s...icky _

Shit. Shit. Fuck. 

_ Thank you, Clovis _and the mist starts to contract around his legs, solid and dangerous. _Keep trying, please. _

Clovis nods minutely, soft locks bouncing in the white air._ I’ll try my best, but Nico_, and he pauses, his eyes furrowing just the slightest, _why would you bring someone with you? That’s not like you at all, man, _And he’s looking past Nico’s shoulder so Nico spins, the mist swirling and opening up, like Nico’s looking down into the eye of a hurricane-

There’s a person. 

There’s-

  
  
  


Copper and bronze, like an

automaton 

given 

Breath-

  
  


_ “-...Di Angelo, you deaf motherfucker, can you _ ** _just_ ** _-”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tank u to the two last commenters. now its everyone elses turn to help me produce some dopamine. kudos and comment, if u know whats good 4 u.


	3. dionysus is back on mommy's relaxing purple juice

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> its still friday is some alternate universe. somewhere. 
> 
> warnings for a panic-attack in the latter half of the chapter. its not too descriptive but im putting a warning here anyways! (starts at "She stops outside her old Cabin" until "Piper doesn't know how long-")
> 
> thank u to everyone who commented. please continue to comment. it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy! even small comments. or some ideas on what u think is happening!
> 
> :)

**CHAPTER III; **

  
  
  


**Camp Half-Blood, Long Island, NY: 20/12/13**

  
  


Nico wakes up and he can’t move. His muscles burn and his scars itch as his body refuses to move from the fetal position. His bones are made from Scythian iron and pressure settles heavily over Nico’s upper body, keeping him pinned to the mattress, even as his muscles ache and his eyes stare forward.

He tries to reign in his panic, counting his breaths and listening to the bustle of existence outside his Cabin, muffled by the thick walls. He concentrates on the voices and the feeling of breath running over chapped lips. His eyes spin wildly in his sockets as he waits for the terrifying paralysis to pass. 

It never gets easier. He wishes it would. 

Bodily movement soon comes back to him. First, his toes, then his fingers, feeling spreading up through his body like cold nectar, inching into his muscles and bones, slowly giving him back his motor skills. The pressure soon lessens enough for Nico to push himself upwards and he winches back at the sun streaming in through the windows. 

He puts a hand in front of his face, looking around his room groggily. Reyna’s gone, with her bed made perfectly behind her, the only trace of her passage being a jacket hung on the bedpost. 

It’s quiet, thankfully. His head is throbbing,  _ still,  _ and Nico wants to go back to sleep.

The getting out of bed part has always been a struggle for Nico. Gathering the courage to get up and _go_. To leave his Cabin and submit himself to existence, to monster-fighting and that constant, terrible feeling that this feeling of peace will not last.   


He can taste the void at the back of his throat, but he doesn’t let in. He has things to do. He will not be  _ weak.  _ But it’s so tempting. To just lie down and submit himself to the shadows.  Nico is tired. Exhausted, even. He’s been in this world for 7, almost 8 years, fighting monsters and fighting things worse than monsters, watching kids die, over and over, feeling it like an iron fist around his heart. He’s being used up, he can feel it and that means he can’t stay this world’s soldier much longer. 

But in the mortal world, he’s confused. Constantly. It’s gotten better, but he still feels like an alien, unused to the technology and the language and the culture. He’s still afraid of a war that’s been over for 70 years and he can’t quite grasp the concept of the internet. He’s strange and stilted, fumbling over words and answers to questions every 21st-century teenage boy should know. 

He still half-expects  the _ Organizzazione per la Vigilanza e la Repressione dell'Antifascismo  _ to come skulking out of the shadows in New York, stalking two men holding hands with cruel grins on their faces, eyes alight with bloodlust. Then they’d turn to Nico, mouths like hungry dogs and eyes twice as worse-

He shoves the thought back, pushing the heels of his hands into his eyes until he can see swirling shapes on the back of his eyelids. He’s half in the now, and half in Italy, or half in some decimated Hotel in Washington and he’s afraid it’ll always be like this. 

He drags himself up and staggers to the window.

It’s bright outside, sun glinting off dirty snow half-covering the dull grass outside, with kids milling around, carrying stuff around or going to practice. It’s not as busy as it usually would be, with everyone who had people to go back going back home, leaving the year-rounders. 

Nico shut the curtains and flips on the main lights, and  _ gods damn  _ the lights. The light cuts into his vison, pain exploding in his head like a bomb. He flinches and scrambles for the light switch again, sighing in relief when the room is plunged into grey light again. 

Oh, so it’s going to be one of  _ those  _ days, huh. 

He quickly switches out his shirt, long-sleeved and plain and stays in the jeans he slept in. He’s sure that...isn’t  _ too _ unsanitary. Maybe. He brushes his teeth in the dark bathroom and tries to tame his hair into something better than the bird’s nest it currently is, but after 5 minutes of it not doing He shrugs on his coat, leather and worn at the elbows, his old aviator hung in his closet for nostalgic purposes. He mutters a prayer to his Father at the shrine and hates himself when he feels his heart sink between his ribs

He walks out into the mild cold, his breath appearing in front of him. The snow crunches under his feet as he unconsciously walks up to the big house, where he can see people rushing around, appearing every so often in the yellow light, like shadow-puppets. 

He closes his eyes against the world for a second and reaches out for the Hephaestus children. 

Alive. And not. The living dead. It makes his stomach turn. 

It’s not  _ natural.  _

He opens his eyes again and walks up the stairs to the wrap-around porch, but he stops before he can get in the pastel-blue door. 

Dionysus is sitting in a lawn chair, sipping diet-coke from a red solo cup. He’s wearing a gaudy Hawaiian print shirt and while Nico has come to respect the great power of a Hawaiin shirt, even he can see the faults of this specific one. 

“Nicholas,” the wine god calls, looking over Camp like it’s his kingdom and he’s planning a war. “Come here, I need to talk”. 

“My name is Nico,” he corrects, more on instinct than him actually caring about what Dionysus calls him and he walks over to him, eyes trained on the god. “And what do you need, Dionysus?”

The god hums, swirling his coke like the finest Merlot. “Well, Nick, thank you for asking. I need a troupe of worshipers, several bottles of the finest wine and for my Father to be less of a hardass. Think you can get that for me?”

Nico frowns, crossing his arms and the god smiles in amusement. “Oh, you big three bunch always had the biggest stick shoved up your asses. Filled with your own importance because Daddy came first out of all of us, with nothing to show for it but some fancy powers and a chip the size of Mount Othrys on your shoulders”

“Did you just call me here to insult me or should I just go?”

Dionysus grins and staggers out of his chair, his violet eyes alight under greasy curls. “Oh, calm down little godling, I’m just having a bit of fun,” and Nico can feel the annoyance under his skin and behind his teeth, like electricity running through his blood. 

“Well, I’m not having  _ fun,”  _ he grits out, the shadows rippling under his feet, “In fact, I’m having the opposite of  _ fun  _ right now. I have had an ongoing migraine for the past week, I broke up with my boyfriend three months ago and I’m still not over it, I’ve got an English essay due which, if I fail it, will impact my entire GPA and, lest we not forget, the entirety of Cabin 9 has taken a permanent detour into fucking la-la land and I can’t even say for sure that they’re  _ alive,  _ so count me down as a killjoy, Dionysus,” he spits, glowering over the god. 

Dionysus sips his coke, rolls his eyes and mummers, “you certainly got his temper,” over the rim of his red solo. 

Nico has about 5 seconds in total to regret ever opening his mouth before Dionysus is moving on, leaning against the porch railing. Nico would say it’s like whiplash if Dionysus was anything but a god. They’re known for their changeable, unknowable moods, like angsty, hormonal pre-teens with the power of creation and immortality at their fingertips. 

“I want to talk to you before I must go blabber to that dusty old Cloven Council, or worse, the Romans. You’re certainly not my… _ favorite  _ godling, but you’re not as empty-headed as most of the little bastards here, and you’ve probably already felt it”

Nico’s stomach bottoms out. 

No.  _ No.  _ He’s finished.  _ He’s done.  _ It’s meant to be someone else’s turn to deal with the gods and their bickering and squabbling, because hadn’t Nico already done enough?. He’s fought gods and Titans and primordials and giants, and his story is  _ finished.  _

But, and Nico already hates himself even more now-

“What do you need?”

And this time, Dionysus didn’t beat around the bush. Unusual for a god, to say the least. “Well, Niall, I think something terrible is happening on Olympus, and I do mean  _ terrible.  _ Nothing small, like Ares threatening war or Father getting in trouble for getting frisky or anything like that. Something monumentally  _ bad  _ is happening”

Nico bites back the _ no shit sherlock  _ that’s forming in his mouth. “Do you think it has something to do with Cabin 9?”

The god snorts, “Of course I do, but short of Hephie tying us all up again, there’s nothing he’d ever do to get his children cursed, and last I checked, Olympus’ Forger has been cooped up since the end of the second Giantomachy”

  
  


_ /a supernova in the sky. too bright, tearing apart the sky as it expands and contracts, like a beating heart made from fire and blood, and it expands one last time and gaia’s  _ ** _scream_ ** _ permeates everything/ _

  
  


“Revenge? Maybe he attacked-”

He shakes his head. “Hephaestus has never been one for revenge, and he’s smart enough to know Valdez’s death can’t be reversed. And it shouldn’t be. Valdez completed his fate, his  _ use,  _ to put it into Hephaestus’ terminology and the old coot understands that, at least”.

The word  _ use  _ puts a bad taste in Nico’s mouth, but he knows Dionysus is right. In both senses. Hephaestus has never been a god to  _ start  _ anything, but always to finish it. He’s a god who unequivocally  _ cares _ about humanity and it’s wellbeing, and he’d never put everything on the line for  _ one  _ son when he had several others to care about. 

And as for the  _ use,  _ that’s the way  _ Leo _ saw the world too. Everything had a purpose, a use in the great machine of the Universe, helping it move and work and exist. He imagined Leo saw himself as a tool, a useful object for killing Gaia, but he also knew that Leo Valdez was a traumatized 16-year-old with a suicidal streak a mile-wide, so gods only knew what he  _ actually _ used to think. 

“Maybe it’s a monster? They could be trying to get back at Leo by cursing his siblings?”

Dionysus is silent. Still. He’s thinking, violet eyes narrowed as he absentmindedly takes a sip of his diet coke. 

“You’re Italian, right Noah?”

The question almost blindsides Nico, but he’s been talking to gods since he was 10 years old. He right his mind, finding his footing and answers back almost immediately. “Yes, I am. I was born in Venice”

Dionysus nods like he’s agreeing to something and he offers Nico his solo cup. It’s half-drunk and dark, not as bubbly as it usually is and...thicker? He blinks at the god, panic sparking in his stomach. Dionysus never just offers  _ his drink  _ to someone, save his daughters and Nico isn’t in the market to be driven insane or poisoned. 

“Oh, calm down Nash and drink it. I have no intention of killing you unless you refuse my hospitality,” and Nico’s sure he  _ will _ kill him if he says no. The gods have killed for less. 

He eyes the drink, but he picks it up, the red plastic crinkling around Nico’s grip. He prays to his Father, as distant as he is lately, and throws back the coke. 

It takes him exactly under a second the realize the liquid he is currently consuming isn’t coke. It’s nowhere near coke or diet coke or Pepsi. It’s thick and heavy, stinging the back of his mouth as it slides down his throat, but still, strangely sweet. 

He coughs, wiping his mouth with the sleeve of his jacket as the heavy, bitter liquid settles warmly in his chest. 

That’s- That’s  _ wine.  _

He gawks and the god grins, like the cat who got the milk, or the god who got the wine. “What the fuck,” he curses, his chest still burning. 

“You said you were Italian,” the god says, stealing the cup back from Nico’s clenched fingers, taking a long sip as he watches Nico cough and splutters, his face blushing with exertion. 

“That doesn’t mean I can  _ drink.  _ Wine-drinking isn’t a genetic ability for us humans”

“It should be, but that’s not what we should be talking about right now, Nicky, is it? Don’t tell me all those hits to the head have finally had an impact?” he says, and he’s right, for once. Not about the head thing- but Dionysus’ curse shouldn’t allow this. He still has a hundred years left or so until he can ever drink wine again and Zeus has never been one to be lenient on his punishments. Ever. The only thing that Zeus loves more than handing out punishments is being a sexual predator. 

But what would make Zeus finish Dionysus’ punishment early, and how the fresh hell does that connect with Cabin 9?

“What’s happening?”

Dionysus snorts, but his wine-dark eyes are tired, showing his age. He’s young for a god, but he’s still much, much older than Nico will ever be. “Something somehow involving Zeus, Hephaestus, and dearly beloved Apollo, which is never good news”

Nico’s heart skips a beat in surprise. “Apollo? What does-”

“Now, Nathan, did you think our favorite Oracle had her little attack because everything’s just dandy with the prophecy god? As if Apollo was just showing his affection by turning her into a malfunctioning emerald light show? No, something’s gone wrong with him,  _ again.  _ Only Mother Rhea knows what”

Nico shifts on his feet, and he can hear the voices getting louder inside the House, his head ringing from the light and noise. On Nico’s bad days, his light sensitivity was amped up to a hundred. He’s always had it but since Tartarus, since the Jar, it’s been worse, but his bad days have been getting more and more frequent. Instead of every few weeks or months, it’s once a week.  Thankfully, it’s just his bad days, not his Bad Days, that are getting more frequent. 

“So Olympus has cut off all contact?  _ Again? _ ” because that’s the only reason Nico can see for Dionysus being in the dark about this. “Can’t they ever deal with a situation like adults?”

“Be careful with who you insult around me, boy. I may be here, but I’m still an Olympian” Dionysus growls, and Nico has the suppress his eye-roll. So Dionysus can insult them, but Nico can’t even make the vaguest remarks about them without getting threatened?. 

Yeah, no, that sounds about right for a god. 

“Forgive me, Lord Dionysus,” he says apologetically, dipping his head slightly. He doesn’t mean it obviously, but Gods live off flattery and Nico isn’t in the mood to get turned into a plant again or get turned to dust. He’s not  _ Percy.  _ “I’m...frustrated, is all. Some communication would solve this situation quicker than us guessing”

Dionysus preens slightly at Nico’s apology, and it must be the wine because Dionysus a _ grees.  _ “You’re right, but Zeus is very, very hesitant to have our problems solved by Demigods after the past two Wars. His Pride was hurt even further when it was Hephaestus’s child who saved us all from the Earth Mother, that old bitch,” and then he chuckled, heartily and smiled fondly, like he was reliving old memories, “Oh, the tantrum he threw back on Olympus when he found out Valdez destroyed Gaia. Saved by a demigod,  _ again,  _ but not even his own Son? Oh, he thundered for hours, until Lady Hera threatened him with castration if he didn’t stop insulting a boy who had been dead for a few hours at most”

Nico’s always hated Zeus. He’s the reason his mom is dead, the reason why Nico couldn’t stay in Italy. He’s selfish and cruel, but this new information makes him  _ angry.  _ Leo’s body wasn’t even cold and Zeus was already complaining, whining,  _ insulting _ him. 

“Fuck him,” he says and waits for the lightning bolt. 

It doesn’t come and Nico understands at that moment, that they are alone. Zeus isn’t listening, can’t hear him and the gods are gone from this world, at least temporarily, hidden in their floating temple. 

“Fuck him, indeed. And fuck us, too, because we are alone with a dozen cursed demigods, no other gods save for yours truly, which could be seen in a  _ very  _ good light if you’re an intelligent person, a malfunctioning Oracle and your strange little affliction”

Nico doesn’t even want to start thinking about how his migraines are related to this clusterfuck. 

The voices inside the House get louder and Nico can’t ignore them anymore. He bids the half-drunk wine god goodbye, as he sways against the wraparound porch railing, the crushed grapes he calls eyes gazing into the middle distance. 

* * *

**Camp Half-Blood, Long Island, NY**

“Dionysus is drinking!” he calls out once he’s inside the War Room and Chiron turns from where he’s trotting around the tennis table, his eyes tired and defeated. He looks ancient. 

“We are well aware of that, Nico, but right now, that is very low on my ladder of concerns. Have you had any success with Clovis in your dreams?” he asks, fiddling with the lid of a pocket-watch. 

“No,” he admits, taking a seat on a plastic chair in the corner. There’s no one here save for him and Chiron and Seymour. The other voices are loud but muffled through the thick floor above Nico’s head. “According to Clovis, they aren’t dreaming, and since there are no dreams to dream-walk, we have no way of knowing what’s happening to their minds”

Chiron stops walking. He looks away from Nico. He sighs. Very Loudly. His hands fist from where he has them joined behind his back. 

If he starts crying, damn all social niceties, Nico’s fucking outta here. 

“Ms.Ramírez-Arellano is currently drafting her report to send back to the Senate. Hopefully, Rome will have some answer where we fall short,” of course, Chiron sounds like he’s asking for help at gunpoint when he says  _ Rome,  _ but nationalistic pride be damned. 

Then, like they’ve all been beckoned to piss on Rome’s name, the Camp Counselors come trudging in, cold and snow-dusted, their voices mingling and their bodies filling up the War Room. They all naturally drift into a loose circle around the table, their moods somber. There are no jokes, no pranks, not today. 

Of course, most of them are here. Called back overnight in fear that this might affect more than just demigods of Hephaestus. He sees Malcolm Pace, Micah Babineaux, Amanda Bevin herself, Miriam Mizrahi and other counselors he can barely remember the names of enclose the table. 

Most of these Counselors would’ve been  _ young  _ when the Giantomachy started, and the Battle for Manhattan would’ve been only told to them through the mouths of those old enough to be there for it, or through whisper and rumor through the younger demigods. 

This might be the generation without War, without a Great Prophecy hanging over their heads, and  _ they _ will be the people to lead Camp into decades of peace and growth. 

Or at least, Nico hopes they will be. 

Nico’s one of the last Counselors who’s taken part in War. It’s him, Will, Malcolm, and a few other relics of a time gone by. 

3-and-a-half years don’t seem that long on paper. But it’s long enough for people to move on, to move on and make new lives for themselves. Not healing, because the scars they all now bear can’t be healed. They can learn to love with them, learn how to work around them and how to minimize the scar tissue, but they can’t be healed. 

Nico’s still grappling with that. That his scars, both physical and mental, will always be with him. He might always fear his powers and the shadows, that he might never be able to go into an elevator. That he’ll always have to use a  _ stupid  _ nightlight. 

It’s times like this when Nico wonders why they ever stopped Luke Castellan. And then Nico reminds himself that Luke Castellan was a weirdo who switched from one group of godly dictatorial assholes to an asshole dictator who was a titan and was directly responsible for the deaths of dozens of demigods. 

It’s about 5 minutes into the meeting when Nico realizes he’s zoned-out completely. 

Shit. 

He desperately tries to look like he’s been paying attention to whatever the fuck Chiron has been talking about. 

“-working with Roman scholars and doctors, we hope to figure out Cabin 9’s affliction as soon as possible. While we wait, however, I urge you all to keep a diligent watch on your cabin-mates and friends. We do not know whether this affects just children of Hephaestus or if it has the ability to spread. And so, in case this is a spreadable disease, I have been urged by our Camp medics to put Cabin 9 into quarantine-”

Nico can see the sense in putting Cabin 9 on lockdown, but at the same time, it makes his skin crawl. Locking them all away like corpses soon to be buried.

There is a lull in the room. 

And then someone throws an empty pringles can at Chiron’s head.

“Fuck that,” hisses Micah Babineaux, head counselor of the Hecate Cabin. They stepped up after Lou-ellen got that advanced-placement thingy with a coven of witches in Washington, who was going to teach her some more ‘advanced spellcasting’. Which made Nico wary. Gods only knew what she could do with ‘ _ advanced spellcasting’.  _

Nico also  _ thinks  _ they were- _ are _ dating Shane Faber. Which explains their stormy face and dark eyes. 

"Do you think I'm gonna let Shane rot in his Cabin,  _ alone,  _ until we can find a cure? And why the Hades haven't we talked to Olympus yet?. If the gods are so mighty then why can’t they help us? Or, better yet, get Lord Hephaestus here! " they say, looking around as if to look for answers in the faces of their comrades. 

Nico can hear hushed agreements, muttered under their breath as they watch Babineaux square up to Chiron. They're tall, around 6 feet even, but that's nothing compared to Chiron's height. But Chiron is frail and ragged. 

"Because Olympus is closed, so that’s a dead-end" he hears himself say. He should shut up. The room drags their eyes over to him and Nico's skin feels tight, his chest too warm. "We are on our own here and what we should be doing is minimizing the damage. We shouldn't risk all of Camp for a few demigods"

Babineaux narrows their eyes at Nico and he can feel their magic sparking off their skin, like sparks from a wildfire. "And those people don't deserve to be locked away and left to  _ rot,  _ Di Angelo _ .  _ What if they're conscious? What if they can hear everything, but just not respond? It would be torture to leave them on their own like that"

Mutters break out around the table and Chiron shakes his head, seeking out Stellan Xu, head counselor of Cabin 15. 

He's a few feet away from Nico, tucked into the arms of his girlfriend, Althea Larsen, a daughter of Nike, sound asleep. Larsen gently shakes her boyfriend, rousing him from his stupor. Xu is a small guy, with sharp, dark eyes and skin like sun-kissed sand. 

The room holds it’s breath. Xu may fall asleep like Clovis, but their mannerism are  _ very _ different. Xu blinks blearily around, his mouth already pulling into a frown as he takes them in. “What do you want?” he mumbles, his voice rough and his voice sparking with frustration like flint off rocks. Last time someone who wasn’t Althea woke Xu out of nowhere, they were put into a week-long coma and Nico isn’t planning on seeing what it’s like to be put into a coma by a child of Hypnos just yet. 

Xu took over after Clovis started up that stupid _ , stupid  _ meditation company in Boston and started living there full time. Now he’s a millionaire because people seem to trust Clovis on helping with their insomnia. 

“What’s the situation with Cabin 9, Stellan, if you wouldn’t mind sparing a few moments to describe you and your siblings’ findings?” Chiron asks, smiling warmly at Stellan despite Stellan’s glowering demeanor. 

Stellan shifts in his girlfriend’s loose grip and lets his face fall into its usual position of hard eyes and a downturned mouth. “None of us can see into their dreams, and judging by their general lack of consciousness or brain activity, I’d call them all legally brain dead. But I’m a child of Hypnos, not Apollo. Someone else needs to make that call, but from us, all greek children of Hephaestus have no brain activity of any kind, so it probably won’t matter if we lock them away. They probably don’t even know what’s happening to them”. 

The room stills. Quietens. A deadly hush falling over the room. 

“Fuck you,” Babineaux spits, the air shimmering with their anger, their hands clenched into dangerous-looking fists. “Fuck you, and  _ fuck _ this. I’m not going to just  _ sit _ here while we let some Roman fuck fix Cabin 9-”

“No one is asking you to, Micah!” exclaims Mitchell, rising up from his pink, plastic chair. “Look for the answers! Help us fix this, but don’t you  _ dare  _ take this out on us!”. 

“Says the guy who isn’t doing jack-shit-”

“Oh, I’m sorry Yang, am I meant to seduce them out of their magic comas? Why don’t you try and fight them into consciousness if you think everyone should help”

“He’s right-”

“Oh, go fuck yourself-”

“We aren’t-

“ _ Yes _ , we are!”

It takes no time at all for the Meeting to devolve into pointless childish arguments. Nico tries his best to fuse to the plastic chair. He’s waiting for the right moment to Travel away, but Chiron’s watching him with tired eyes, like he’s saying ‘ _ if I have to be here, then so do you’.  _ So, Nico settles for curling into a ball and closing his eyes, like that’s going to help soothe his migraine. 

It doesn’t, but at least no one is speaking to him. 

And then, like a glorious, blond-haired angel who Nico ruined a relationship with, Will descended upon the room. He whistles, not his super-sonic whistle or they would all be dead or deaf, but a plain, high-pitched shriek of a whistle. The room focuses its attention on the freckled covered, eye-bags-having zombie standing beside Chiron. 

“Can you all, for  _ 7 fucking seconds,  _ act like responsible demigods? If you’re going to argue, do it responsibly and with a bit more tact. Also, I have a patient trying to sleep upstairs, and if she’s disturbed again, I’ll show you what your own organs look like removed from your body, you childish-”

“ _ William _ ,” Chiron stresses and Will deflates a bit, running a hand through messy locks. 

His heart does a series of complicated gymnastics routines against his ribcage. 

“Sorry, Chiron, I just came down to say,” and he shifts on his feet. He’s nervous. Which makes Nico nervous. Will being nervous usually implies he’s about to deliver a child or invent a new antidote to some mysterious and deadly poison. “Well, Xu and I talked, and after some very helpful Cabin 11 occupants helped me procure an EEG in a very short space of time, I, as head Medic of Camp, can declare that, despite the continued signs of life, the occupants of Cabin 9 can be declared legally brain-dead”

Well, that certainly isn't fucking good. _ _

It’s one thing to think about it. It’s another to hear it from Will.  What the fuck is happening on Olympus? Why Cabin 9? Why now? Cabin 9, the closing of Olympus, complete disconnection of the gods, Rachel, Nico's headaches- there's nothing _rational _about this.  Something is stirring, and Nico is blind in the storm’s eye. It blusters and rages all around him, but he can’t see what or why or where. 

He lets out a shaking breath. Most people do. The anger has been replaced with exhaustion and hopelessness. 

Babineaux, however, takes this news in a much more...destructive way. 

All the warning Nico gets is the air shimmering with heat before his body is acting on impulse. He falls backward into a shadow, falling on top of Will on the other side of the room just in time to push him to the floor and dodge Babineaux’s fireball. 

They’re crying. Their dark skin blushing red as tears well in their mix-matched eyes. “ _ No _ , Shane can’t be- I didn’t-”

Their skin heats again and the crowd swarms, reaching out to them, voices raised as hands reach out to them but they don’t need to stop them in the end. 

** _“_ _Stop_ _”_ **

The voice is deep and soft as honey, stilling the entire room. No one can move. Nico is stuck holding Will to the floor, his fingers clenched in the fabric of the back of his t-shirt. The floor is hard and cold underneath the both of them, and Will’s shirt fabric is starchy and rough in his hands. 

Piper McLean has always been dangerous, and grief and years have just added to that. Her hair is longer than when he last saw her, tied back in a single braid with strands loose around her strong face, brushing against cold-bitten cheeks and the faint, smooth scars across her face. Her lips, cracked and red, are downturned and her whiskey eyes take in the room with bored carelessness. 

She steps fully into the room, her puffy, bright yellow jacket dusted with snow, but that does little to dull the obnoxious color of it. “So,” Piper drags, rocking back on her heels, quite happy to keep everyone in an awkward stasis as she arches an ashy eyebrow at them all. “What’s up, guys?”

* * *

Piper sits outside the Big House, looking across Camp and rolls an unlit cigarette between her fingers. 

It’s cold, so cold and Piper’s California skin burns at the harsh, icy breeze, despite her lovely yellow jacket. She wishes she had Nico’s natural ignorance to the cold. 

Or she wishes-

The cigarette is smooth between the pads of her fingers, the paper crinkling faintly as it shifts. She gingerly places it between her painfully cracked lips, the dry paper catching on the skin, but the feel of it is familiar. Comforting. 

It takes a few flicks for her lighter to come alive, a controlled flame floating above the small contraption. The heat hits her cold face, so she lets herself bask in it, just for a moment, before she dips the end of the cigarette into the flame, pulling it back up once the end turns a bright red-yellow. 

She always has to hold back tears when she takes the first drag. 

It’s not that she’s unused to the heavy, tangy burn of the smoke at the back of her throat, but it’s the smell. The smell of the smoke as it curls out of her mouth and clings to her hair and skin. It  _ hurts.  _ Even after three years, it still refuses to scab over, that specific wound. It stubbornly stays open, slowly growing infected no matter how many bandages Piper puts over it. 

She digs the heels of her hands into her eyes until she can see bruises on the backs of her eyelids, hoping to push back the creeping tide of memories. Camp always does this, always makes it easier to remember  _ him.  _ It’s a double-edged sword, thinking about him. 

She takes another drag and tries not to think. Fullstop. 

“Have you tried cutting down, at least?” says a voice behind her, and that southern drawl, lazy and faint, makes her  _ think-  _ but no. She turns her head slightly to see Will make his way down to her, setting himself down beside her, his features drawn and tired. 

“Nah,” she drawls, flicking the ash off the cigarette, her eyes focused on the dirt. “Been too busy. Sorry”. She doesn’t mean the apology, but Will doesn’t push it. 

“So,” Will draws out, “How’s UCLA treating you?”

She smiles around her next drag. UCLA. The one thing she’s happy about in the past three and a half years. “Good. Really good. It’s only my first year, but I’m...excited,” and Will is practically vibrating at this confession. He’s quiet, waiting for her to go on, so she obliges him. “What we’re studying right now is actually really interesting, which you wouldn’t expect of property law, but my grades are good and I’m looking forward to...helping people, I guess”. 

“That’s fantastic, Piper,” and Will’s exhaustion is momentarily replaced with his usual bright-eyed grin. But Piper needs to keep going. She needs to fix-  _ whatever _ this is. It’s a physical ache in her chest and she needs to keep going until she can leave Camp and not think about it for another 3-and-a-half years. 

“So…I heard we got a message from Rome”

His face falls. 

It’s gotten dark, the sun nearly gone behind the horizon. They had spent the last few hours organizing the Counselors and Piper had tried her charmspeak on Harley. It hurt her, to see the kid so motionless, completely still in his bed. She felt a responsibility for him since  _ he _ was gone, and her guilt is dangerously sharp, even now, hours later, Harley’s closed eyes and grey skin linger on the edges of her vision. She ordered and ordered him to wake up, her charmspeak so thick in her voice that her throat felt raw and bloody once she finished. But he was still. Quiet. 

Then, once it was clear that it wouldn’t work, they had gotten to work finding other children of Hephaestus, ones living vaguely normal loves with vaguely normal loved ones and all their calls so far had ended in ‘ _ they’re sick’  _ or ‘ _ they’re in the hospital and they won’t wake up’.  _

Piper’s cigarette is gone, leaving nothing but the butt of it, which she lets fall into the grass below her. 

“Yeah,” Will says, swallowing thickly as he let his head hang, “Yeah, we got an Iris Message from Praetor Hazel Levesque. Rome has the same problem as us. All children of Vulcan are in the same state as Cabin 9, while the Legacies are conscious. But they’re feverish and sickly, sleeping for hours at a time and only waking up long enough to be fed”. 

“Well. Shit. That sounds...bad”. 

So eloquent, Piper. Dozens of people and children are trapped in magical-brain-dead-comas and it only  _ sounds bad _

Will sighs. Heavily. Letting his head drop into his hands. “And I’m still worried about Nico’s migraines. He’s not taking care of himself-”

“He’s a big boy, Solace,” she interrupts, standing up and brushing her jeans off, “He’s old enough to make his own dumb mistakes and solve them himself if he’s ignoring help”. 

Will still frowns, his forehead scrunching in exhausted anger. “I guess,” he relents, but Piper can tell it’s half-hearted at best. Will is a good person, to a fault. He  _ needs  _ to help people, even if those people can only really help themselves. And, sometimes, it seems like it does more damage than he’d like. 

Piper knows better than most that if someone is drowning, you throw them a lifesaver and try to offer a hand. You don’t get in those shark-infested waters with them and hope you both don’t fucking drown or get eaten by the sharks under the waves. 

Old bitterness fizzles in her chest, but she’s too exhausted to think about sustaining it. It dies away, leaving her feeling bereft and hollow. 

She almost misses when she used to be so angry that  _ anger _ was all she could feel. 

She takes one last look at Camp, as it spreads out beneath them, from the Cabin’s torches lit up and the cool, cold, grey Atlantic rushing against the dark beach, the half-hidden moon beginning to shine down as the sun creeps below the cloudy horizon. The green and wet grass is dotted with half-melted snowdrifts, turning the ground into a wet mess. 

She missed the East Coast, too, strangely enough. She missed its brutal character and changeable moods. 

He always liked this coast better-

Maybe she’ll go and see what she can do to help now that her only useful power has been proven useless. 

For a couple of hours, she helps some kids with contacting the next of kin of the Cabin 9 kids. Half of them don’t  _ have _ next of kin, and the three who do, Harley, Luchtaine, and Magdelene, are easy enough to deal with. 

Magdelene’s mothers, Sara and Valentina, are frazzled and currently in Bogotá, but Piper’s been learning Spanish, so she only embarrasses herself a little bit when talking to them. Piper soothes their worries as best as she can, but Piper cried when her Roomba broke, so she can’t imagine what it must feel like to be told your 14-year-old daughter is currently in a magic coma. 

“ _ We’re exploring every avenue, Mrs. and Mrs. Cardozo _ ,” he tells them, her voice stilted and awkward with the clunky Spanish words, “ _ We will _ -”

“ _ What about Heph? Has he not done something? He told us he would take care of Maggie while she was in the States- _ ” Sara Cardozo rushes, her voice thick with panicked grief. “ _ He is a god! That must count for something!”. _

Christ, it should, but in the end, the gods are just humans with immortality and powers. They are human to a fault, sometimes, and others, so far removed from humanity that it makes Piper’s head spin. 

She wants to tell these grieving women  _ something.  _ She wants to make them hopeful. But she doesn’t and she hates herself for it. 

“ _ We will get you your daughter back, but for now, she must stay at Camp until she’s woken up _ ,”  _ or she dies _ , is left unsaid, but Piper can feel the impression of the words on her tongue. “ _ Please trust us, Mrs. and Mrs. Cardozoz,”  _ and Piper already hates herself, so she decides it won’t hurt to just pile it on. She lathers her voice in charmspeak, so strong she can feel it covering her tongue like a film of poison honey. 

“ _ We trust you _ ,” Sara Cardozo says, a dreamy hint to her voice. 

Piper hangs up with a courteous goodbye and a promise to inform them of updates and tries not to burst out crying. 

The other two go over...okay-ishly. Harley’s Dad is angry, but he does promise to wait. If worst comes to worst, and they sleep past when they’re meant to return to school and normal life, their guardians will stay quiet. 

Camp really doesn’t need another kidnapping/missing child case. 

Luchatine’s mother almost causes an international crisis. Apparently, he hadn’t thought it was important that he was descended from something called a  _ Fenian,  _ an ancient Irish warrior, and that his mother was  _ very _ important in the Celtic mythology circles, so he told no one and Chiron had to talk in a separate room to Sinead Breathnach, where her loud screeching couldn’t be heard. 

By time Piper’s walking back to her Cabin, where Mitchell’s so  _ generously _ given her a bed, it’s pitch black. Her boots crunch in the freshly-fallen snow and her lungs twinge uncomfortably in the too-clear air. The torches cast long shadows over the Cabins. The Cabins themselves are dark and quiet. 

What time is it? 12 PM? 2 AM? Piper’s internal clock is in smithereens. 

She stops outside her old Cabin, nostalgia hitting her like a bus. It hurts. It hurts so much, just  _ being  _ here. It runs like a running commentary in the back of her head, never quiet.  _ And that’s where he pranked Drew and that’s where you and him and Jason snuck out to so you could see the stars and that’s where you finally beat him at the Lava Wall and that’s where he told you that he’d be right back, his teeth like stars in his mouth as he grinned getting back up on Festus back to stop Gaia and that’s the place where you watched him die and that’s the place where you saw his body and that’s the place where you burned what was left- _

Distantly, she realizes that, oh, this is a panic attack. That’s not great, no, shit, that’s not good at all, but she can’t stop, now that her mind in free-fall, her bones stretching and cracking under thin, tight skin as her lungs grow smaller and smaller, filling with poisoned air. Her ribs close around them in a deadly embrace and the wet, snow-damp grass is cool under her hands. She fists her hand in the blades, vaguely feeling the wet seep into the fabric of her jeans. 

Her heart is beating so hard it hurts, hurts so much and Piper thinks that this must be what a heart attack feels like. It’s trying to dig it’s way out of her chest, crashing against her ribcage and the delicate tissue of her chest. She can’t- oh god she wants to, but she- she can’t, oh gods shit shit shit shit. 

“-per, Piper can you hear me? Can you do something to tell me that you can hear me?” someone with a  _ lovely _ voice says. Her chest heaves and heaves, and she can taste salty tears on her lips. 

“Piper, you can do this. Just...a nod, or a tap or a noise. Please,” and who is Piper to refuse her? She jerks her head slightly and the person sighs in relief. “Okay. Good. You’re doing great. Do you want me to not touch you?”. 

_ Touch.  _ Piper needs touch. She needs someone else to drag her out of the void she’s barely floating in. She can’t do it on her own. With heavy sobs, because she’s crying now, oh christ, she fumbles out blindly with an arm, putting all her weight on her other arm. 

Her arm wraps around the person’s neck, and Piper pulls herself forward into their embrace, burying herself in their neat, dark hair and their smell. Mint and their own shampoo. Piper  _ melts  _ when she recognizes this smell. 

“ _ Reyna,”  _ she half-sobs half-sighs, pulling herself further into Reyna. Reyna is here and she isn’t anywhere. It’s just them, in a space of white that smelt of Reyna. Reyna says nothing, but her arms wrap around Piper’s back, one of her hands gingerly rubbing up and down her spine. 

Piper doesn’t know how long they stay like that, but they stay kneeling outside of the Aphrodite Cabin until Piper can breathe again and she knows where they are. 

“I’m sorry,” she croaks into Reyna’s cold, sweat-slick neck. 

“Shut up, McLean,” she tells her, her voice soft but commanding. 

Piper shuts up. Is this what charmspeak feels like to other people?.

“Do you want to move? You’re too cold. It’s not healthy for you to be out here like this,” Reyna almost  _ stiffly  _ says, her mouth moving against Piper’s hair. 

Piper doesn’t really want to move. The exhaustion is settling back into her bones, replacing the panic with bone-weary tiredness. She doesn’t feel the cold, either, not under where she’s buried in her own skin. 

But Reyna must be so cold. 

She nods against Reyna’s neck, and the girl helps Piper onto her unsteady legs, her feet struggling to find a steady hold in the melted grass and ice. 

Reyna wraps a strong arm around Piper’s waist and Piper’s skin burns. 

But before Reyna can bring Piper into the Aphrodite Cabin, Piper’s voice comes bubbling up her throat. “Can I stay with you?” she asks, and Piper cringes at how  _ weak  _ she sounds. “I-I-uh, don’t really want to-”

“I understand,” Reyna tells her. She’s slightly shorter than Piper since Piper shot up to her final height of 5’9, but she seems larger than life right now. “I understand completely, Piper,” and Piper doesn’t doubt for a second that she does. 

Reyna leads Piper towards Cabin 13, her arm still securely wrapped around Piper. 

Cabin 13 is warm. Candlelight flickers on the walls and it smells sweet and comforting. Like a peaceful death. 

Reyna tells her Nico’s gone to check to see if Olympus really  _ is _ closed. Piper feels a twinge of disappointment. She wanted to talk to him, at least for a couple of minutes...

Piper, of course, didn’t think she’d be spending the night, so she borrows some pants from Hazel’s closet, the one she uses when she’s at CHB and Reyna throws her a shirt. It smells of her, but Piper is too tired and too numb to blush. If fits Piper, but the shoulders a bit loose. 

She changes quickly and settles into one of the many spare beds even quicker, ducking under the covers and curling into a ball. 

She falls asleep. She doesn’t dream. And  _ that’s _ what frightens her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> see y'all next weekend!! hope u enjoyed!


	4. a prophecy and a worryingly strange sex dungeon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey!!! its still...kinda friday!
> 
> thank u to all those who gave kudos and comments!!. im shameless so im going to ask for more, though. feed me. also, gimme some feedback! what do y'all think? bad? good? got any suggestions or tips? have any idea where this is going and/or what's happening? gimme it all! i'll be happy to hear what y'all are thinking about this :)

  
  


**CHAPTER IV;**

**Kyoto, Japan; 21/12/13**

Nico has, apparently, accidentally, traveled to Japan again. 

Now, this wouldn’t be a problem if Nico wasn’t nearly 18 fucking years old and been Shadow-Travelling since he was 11-years-old. 

Nico had  _ (mostly) _ accurately traveled across Europe and the Atlantic Ocean. A quick trip from Camp to New York should’ve been simple. Easy. So simple Nico did it  _ regularly in his sleep. _ But  _ somehow,  _ he had fucked up so badly he crossed the country and the Pacific Ocean and stepped out in front of a small, side-alley restaurant in  _ Kyoto.  _

What the  _ fuck.  _

He blinks wildly at the small, neon-shadowed alley he’s stepped into. A distant sun shines above, covered by thick clouds, heavy with rain. He covers his sensitive eyes against the sun with the back of his hand as he tries to get his bearings. 

It’s familiar, this place. This is one of the few places, that if Nico is shadow-traveling blindly, he’ll end up. This stupid, little back-alley in Kyoto. 

What the fuck. What the fresh, ever-living fuck. Nico wasn’t shadow-traveling blindly. He was traveling with a purpose in mind. He was focused, he wasn’t injured, he  _ knew  _ New York and where he wanted to go. 

It was always so simple. 

Nico stumbles back into the wall he formed from. 

At the mouth of the alley, a small Japanese woman, with plastic shopping bags in her hands, watches a boy appear and disappear. 

She screams, as you do. 

* * *

**Athens, Greece: 21/12/13**

Nico finds himself at the Acropolis. 

He’s suddenly assaulted with so much old magic he nearly pukes. He doubles in half as he forms from the shadows of a crumbling pillar, acidic bile bubbling at the base of his throat, but he doesn’t throw up. 

This place is the oldest place, one of the most sacred places on Earth for Hellenistic Demigods, and Nico can feel it. The place where Athens was born and where Gaia rose again.

_ NewYorkNewYorkNewYorkNewYorkNewYorkNewYork _

He melds back into the shadows, falling and falling, not up or down or sideways. Just falling, through and above the ice, trying not to listen to the begging pleas of the dead. 

* * *

**Chicago, Illinois; 21/12/13**

He’s stepped out in front of a house. 

Blue, with white-trimmings, windows boarded-up and the door blown off its hinges. It’s a ghost of its past self, only remnants remaining of what used to be a beautiful suburban two-story house. 

Its front lawn is dead and brown, rusting playground equipment crumbling in the yard. 

Nico stands witness to this house, but he doesn’t dare go inside. The house smells so badly of death that even Nico is wary of it. It pollutes the house, seeping into Nico’s clothes until he can’t smell anything other than the stench of the dying. 

There are several shallow holes in the grass. One is recently covered up, fresh dirt making a mound over it. 

Nico stares at it for he doesn’t know how long. 

The house and its ghosts stared back. Too wide mouths and bloody clothing. Some had bullets wounds, perfectly round on their foreheads. Some had no wounds at all, just peaceful smiles and dead eyes. 

The house calls to him.

A sign creaks in the wind. Someone calls out to Nico, light falling on his back as he stands in darkness. 

_ run. go. dont look back.  _

He takes the voice’s advice. 

  
  


* * *

**Hotel Valhalla, Boston; 21/12/13**

The Hotel is quiet. Then it isn’t because Nico is throwing up onto Hotel Valhalla’s carpet floors. 

“Oh, that’s not good,”

Nico is on his hands and knees and he groggily lifts his head to see Alex Fierro standing above him. Alex’s arms are crossed, wearing bright pink sleeping clothes. It’s a matching set. Alex’s pendant, bright green against Alex’s collar-bones, is the symbol for  _ female.  _

Alex grins down at him, her smile all canines and terrifying eyes. “Had a dream about you, Di Angelo,”

Nico wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, shakily bringing himself up on his feet. “Was it exciting?”

Alex rolls her eyes, her mix-matched eyes almost glowing in the dark hallway. “Yeah. Really got my blood going. Now get out. This place is for the Dead Norse. You are possibly the exact opposite of a dead Norse”. 

Nico flips her off. Alex raises a dark, bushy eyebrow at him, her eyes holding that murderous intent that made her and Nico friends so fast. That look that told Nico that she had died, hadn’t been impressed and was looking for something better. 

“I’ll leave,” and like fucking Hades is Nico shadow-traveling again, “but first. Do you have a phone I could borrow? I need to call a ride”. 

* * *

**Camp Half-Blood, Long Island, NYC; 21/12/13**

Piper wakes up and doesn’t immediately know where she is. Which is new, fun, interesting and fucking terrifying. 

Her hair’s in her mouth and she can feel the sun of her face, the mattress under her body and a soft comforter over her. This does little to calm her bemused panic. 

For a second, she thinks she’s had a one night stand again at someone else’s apartment, but this is definitely-

Camp. 

Oh. Right. 

She groans in the pillow but pushes herself up on her hands, fumbling her way out of the bed, brushing wild, dark hair out of her mouth. She can feel dried drool on her cheek and her muscles ache and her scars twinge uncomfortably. 

She blinks around the room, and it’s completely empty. Oh  _ shit,  _ how long did she sleep? She stumbles to her discarded jeans, fumbling her phone out of her pocket. It’s on airplane mode since Camp has fuck all service, but the cracked screen displays the time.  _ 12:37.  _ She grimaces. That’s...not too bad, right?. 

She rushes through her morning routine. Stretches, brushing her knotted hair out with a random comb, rinsing her mouth since she’s got no toothbrush and quickly changing her clothes. Plain jeans and a long-sleeved, button-up shirt she’s 100% sure she stole off a girl she used to sleep with tucked into the waistband. It’s a nice shirt. It’s green, with purple, brown and orange stripes. 

It’s not ugly. She  _ loves _ it. 

She steps out of Cabin 13 and has no idea what the fuck she’s meant to do now. 

Go back to LA? It seems like the most logical decision. She’s not working with Camp anymore, and it’s not like her charmspeak can help. Whatever is happening is cordially  _ not _ her problem anymore. 

It’s  _ not _ . 

Her feet are carrying her to the Big House regardless. 

Half of her, more than half of her is telling her to leave, go, they  _ don’t _ need you anymore, but some part of her balks of leaving the people  _ he _ considered  _ family _ to the mercy of Fate. Clarisse told her that Nyssa is sleeping too, locked up in her apartment. Jake’s partner has checked Jake into the  _ hospital  _ because he just suddenly fell asleep and wouldn’t wake up. 

This is  _ his  _ Family. And Piper cares about who he cared about. 

She passes young demigods, milling around, their eyes following her as she walks. 

‘ _ That’s Piper McLean’  _ they whisper, their eyes like glittering, blood-soaked stones,  _ ‘she was apart of the Last Great Prophecy. She knew that guy who killed Gaia, y’know, L-’  _

She almost flings herself into the Big House. 

And waiting for her in the main hall is Nico and Percy. They’re talking to each other in low voices. 

A smile blooms across her face, and Nico catches her eyes, a grin quirking on his own lips. Percy turns and his smile is the brightest, his green eyes glittering. “Piper!” and suddenly, Piper has an arm-full of Percy Jackson. He’s steady and smells like a mix of Annabeth’s perfume and sea salt. 

“Hey Perce,” she mumbled into his shoulder where her mouth is pressed, and Percy pulls back, his eyes quickly roving over her, making sure she still has all her limbs or something. “It’s good to see you, dude. Didn’t expect to see you here, though”. 

Percy lets her go completely, shoving his hands in his hoodie pockets. “Yeah, I was just dropping Nico off, but apparently Rach wants to talk, so I’m sticking around until she’s ready”

Shit. Rachel. Piper heard about what happened at the Meeting and worry builds in her chest. “Do you know if she’s okay?” she asks, and she can see the same worry flickering over Percy’s face, his glittering eyes darkening. 

“I hope so. Hey, Nico, do you know if Rachel’s okay?” 

“She’s not dying, if you’re asking, but she didn’t look good the last time I saw her at that Camp Counselor Meeting. But it’s been radio silence about her since,” and Piper wants to scream. What the fuck is happening? Nothing happening makes any sense! How does the Oracle connect to Hephaestus! It doesn’t!.

But instead of screaming, she roughly rubs her face with the heel of her palm, counting to ten. 

She hears Percy sigh. “Bet you five bucks and half-eaten donut I have in my car-”

“So lucrative-”

“Shut up, Nico,  _ anyways,  _ I bet my impressive five dollars and a donut from my Dunkin’ Donuts weekly trip that Rachel has a prophecy. For us.”

Piper can feel her eyebrows raising incredulously, crossing her arms over herself. “Really? For us? That seems…”

“Unlikely. Improbable,” Nico finishes for her, taking a stance similar to Piper’s. “Even if Rachel does issue a prophecy, it’s unlikely they’ll give it to  _ us.  _ We’re old news now, Percy. There are better, younger, less…”  _ damaged _ , “worn-out Campers now”. 

“Nah,” Percy simply says, leaning up against a wall, him in stark contrast to the pale walls, “I’ve got a feeling it’s for us. Gut-instinct, y’know?” and Piper regretfully knows that Percy’s usually right when he trusts his instincts. 

Shit. 

“I’ll take that bet,” Nico says because where Percy was calculative, Nico was stubborn. 

They shake hands. Piper notes that Nico’s almost level with Percy. Percy still got an inch and a half on him, but Nico’s almost there. With the way both of their black hair curls at the end, their high,  _ regal _ bone-structure and their intense glares matching each other, you could almost mistake them for brothers. Of course, Percy was  _ significantly _ darker than Nico and Nico only had a pale smattering of freckles on his face to imply he saw the sun at all. 

“Are you guys done dick-measuring, or should I give you two some privacy?”

Nico throws her a dirty look, but Piper hands it right back. Little Punk can’t scare her. “We’re good,” Nico mumbles, rolling his eyes. 

“Actually, Nico, I’ve always been curious-"

Nico kicks Percy directly in the shin, but that doesn’t wipe Percy’s grin off his face. In fact, it just gets wider. Piper is currently hiding her mouth behind her hand. 

“You’re both crude idiots,” Nico huffs, a scowl edging its slow way on his lips, but Piper knows Nico enough to know that this particular scowl means he’s bemusedly amused. 

Percy sticks his tongue out in protest at Nico. 

“Nico,” she starts, turning to the boy who’s engaged in a light match of staring with Percy, as her brain starts to work through her the cotton over her mind from sleep “why did you need a ride back to Camp? Don’t you have a  _ built-in _ ride function? Isn’t that one of your  _ main _ abilities?”

Panic passes over Nico’s features for a second, but he suppresses it, which is Nico is prone to do with most emotions. But before he can tell Piper why he just decided to get a ride back with Percy when he can literally  _ teleport,  _ Will comes bounding down the main stairwell. 

Piper watches Nico’s face go through a gymnastic performance of emotion at the sight of Will. Piper would pay so much money to know what exactly caused them to split.  _ So _ much money _ .  _

Will, in Piper’s opinion, looks better than the limited amount of times Piper saw him yesterday. He’s got some of his color back and his eyes seem less...haggard. He’s still got two suitcases under his eyes but he looks  _ better.  _

He stops when he sees Piper, but his smile triples in brightness. “Good, most of y’all are here already. D’ya know where I can find Reyna?”

“She’s in Chiron’s office talking to a Roman Augury, I think,” Nico says, his dark eyes darting around awkwardly. 

His Face says,  _ ‘ha, fuck you, I don’t care. I’m cool and collected’.  _ His eyes say, ‘ _ why did you leave me will I’m so sad’  _ or something  _ along _ those lines. 

“Cool. I’ll- uh, go get here,” and Will swallows awkwardly, shifting on his feet, “Y’all can go up to Rachel now-”. His demeanor changes when he says Rachel’s name, becoming more serious. “She’s better, but she’s still pretty week, so I suggest not pushing her too hard”. 

_ Or you’ll be dealing with me,  _ is left hanging in the air. 

Percy walks up the stairs unbothered, not because he’s oblivious to the weird tension between Nico and Will, but because he simply does not give a flying fuck about it. 

Piper drags Nico up the stairs and she sees Will disappear to go look for Reyna out of the corner of her eyes, and the weird, tense, vaguely-sad energy dies to a low hum. Thank gods. 

The three of them fumble around the upper-floor for a while, ducking into rooms, looking for Rachel. They come across a few...strange rooms. A few not-human skeletons, a room filled with grapes, what Piper swears is a  _ sex dungeon _ and after a few minutes of playing  _ ‘get distracted by everything in these new, strange rooms _ ’, which is a common occurrence for them all, they find Rachel. ADHD is an Extreme Sport most days, and most days, Piper loses. 

Well...they kind of find Rachel. It’s more like Rachel finds them. 

Piper has spent five minutes exploring what she personally believes is Dionysus’ magic sex dungeon, carefully not touching anything and not looking at that medium-sized, bronze carved statue of a...well-endowed Party Pony. 

Oh, gods, she hopes that’s a party pony. If that’s- if that’s Chiron Piper will start crying. Just- so many tears. Those theories that float around Camp that Mr.D and Chiron are secretly fucking or dating follow her like the heaviest of sins. 

Nico has taken up standing in a corner and not looking at anything. 

Percy is rifling with careless abandon through the cabinets like he doesn’t fear what they could hold. What crimes against nature hide in them. 

“Three of the most powerful demigods of this Age and you get lost on a single goddamn floor. How did you guys ever  _ win _ ?”

Piper swings to see Drew standing in the doorway, hands on her hips and her makeup so sharp it looks like it could cut steel. 

“Stupid luck and the fact that the other guys were  _ much _ dumber,” Percy answers smoothly, still rifling through this room’s compartments, once again displaying how little he had left to fear. 

“The power of friendship and heterosexual love,” Nico answers from his corner. 

Drew rolls her eyes, muttering probably rude things under her breath. Her sister is dressed impeccably, of course, with high-waisted black jeans and some satin top-thing, her long, silky black hair falling over her shoulder. She looks freezing and Piper wants to make her put on a coat. 

“ _ Drew _ ,” she breathes, a smile making it’s home on Piper’s face and her sister rolls her eyes, but she hugs Piper. She hugs like she’s being made to do this at gunpoint, but Piper can sense the sincerity in it. 

“Piper,” she says and pulls her back, holding her by the shoulds, looking her up and down, “what the  _ fuck _ are you wearing?”

“Dad shirts are  _ in _ , Drew”

“No, no they’re not. They really aren’t. Shit, it’s making me  _ ill.  _ But we don’t have enough time in the world to discuss your fashion-choices, my future-seeing girlfriend wants to talk to your dumbasses”

~

Rachel Elizabeth Dare looks like death warmed over. But if death was warmed over in a shitty microwave and death was a microwavable meal. 

“Hey guys,” she croaks, lying in an absurdly large bed in an even larger room. She’s propped up on several thousand pillows and her face is pale and drawn, her freckles standing in stark contrast to the rest of her skin. “You good?”

“We’re good, you?” Percy says, taking a seat at the edge of her bed. She looks fondly up at him, her mouth quirking into an almost smile. 

“Been better, Perce. Been  **way** better, I feel like that night after my 18th, except worse, somehow” and her voice cracks towards the end, so Drew shoves a bottle of water in her hand. Rachel drinks, but her face screws up in pain. 

"Shit,” Percy says, almost unconsciously, and Piper has to agree. Percy edges towards her, wrapping his arms around her and Rachel falls into his embrace. 

“As sweet as this is, I’m going to have to ask you guys to hurry it the fuck up,” Drew interrupts, standing with one hip cocked and an eyebrow raised in her pattened ‘ _ I’m judging you _ ’ look. 

Rachel rolls her eyes and so does Percy, matching greek-fire eyes throwing themselves up to heaven. But Percy pulls back, sitting on the bed as Rachel falls weakly against the pillows. 

“I’m going to assume you all heard about what happened 2 days ago at the camp counselor meeting? With me and Delphi?” and they all nod their heads. Drew falls against the bed, pulling her girlfriend close like she’s a large ginger teddy-bear. Rachel continues like nothing at all has changed. “Well, Delphi was in the process of prophesying some stuff. I got,” she frowns, her forehead scrunching up, “Half a prophecy. Maybe less, maybe a little bit more, but not the full thing before Delphi started freaking out. She’s currently not talking at all to me either, not even for little things, so whatever has her mute must either really freak her out or be really powerful”

“But you’re okay?” Percy asks and Drew buries herself further into Rachel.

“I’m...not feeling a 100% but I’m not, like, actively dying, I think?”

“You’re not”

“Thank you for the reassurance, Nico”

“Always a pleasure”

Piper inches forward, clambering up on the foot of the bed like an excited child at Christmas. “So, why call us here?”

Rache shifts, casting her eyes up to the ceiling. “The prophecy, it’s for you”

None of the react like how people usually react when they get a prophecy. Piper thinks it’s the trauma. 

“Called it. Di Angelo, you’re now in my debt”

Nico flips him off. It’s not very effective. 

Piper just feels both excitement and anguish building up in her ribs. On one hand, it’s a quest, and shit, those things are addictive. The danger, the rush, it’s hard to get away from. On the other hand, it’s a quest and Piper can’t watch more people die. 

“So,” Percy drawls, his face splitting in his trademarked troublemaker smirk, “What’s the objective, boss?”

At this, Rachel frowns, looking up at her girlfriend for a few beats. She’s thinking, that’s clear and they wait as patiently as three ADHD-riddled demigods can. She and Drew seem to be silently talking, with eyebrows and mouths, trying to decide something. 

Finally, Rachel opens her mouth, her face drawn and tight as she sits up fully. “I...I can’t tell you what this prophecy fully means, that’s up to you guys, but-” and she swallows, “if this means what I think it means, then we have something terrible and huge and all-around  _ bad _ on our hands”

Disappointment and fear bloom in equal measure in Piper’s chest. 

“Piper,” Rachel starts again, “just...don’t get your hopes up. Prophecy’s don’t always tell us the full truth and this one is only half-complete, so it could mean any number of things”

Drew is looking at her too. Booth girls are. Green and deep brown against whiskey. “She’s right, little sister. Don’t set yourself for pain,”

Piper is really confused. Piper is worried and confused and anxious, but she keeps quiet, steadying herself for whatever Rachel gives them. She can hear Nico shifting behind them, his breathing steady and even. She copies it, trying to rein in her thundering heart. 

And, just as Rachel has steadied herself and Piper has chased away a panic-attack, she gives them a prophecy. Drew watches her. Everyone else watches Rachel. She closes her eyes, losing herself in her own head, her voice rough and soft at the same time, her ‘_s’s_ sliding together subconsciously. It’s hypnotic. 

And with 6 lines of prophecy, Rachel Elizabeth Dare ruins Piper McLean. 

  
  


_ forge hides in the garden city _

_ where he first lost breath _

_ to the shadow of his ever-lurking death _

  
  


_ but beauty and death  _

_ shall restore his lost breath _

_ found again in the land without rain _

  
The silence is so loud after Rachel is done speaking that Piper wants to scream. That impulse, to fill the silence with something outrageous and obnoxious. 

She doesn’t. She sits still, still trying to copy Nico’s breathing. 

“Forge” she hears herself say, her voice separating from her body, “That’s the name he got in our first quest”

_ (forge and dove shall break the cage) _

“That line,” Nico says behind her, his voice fast and unstable, like the words are rushing over each other to get out, “ _ beauty and death shall restore his lost breath _ \- does that mean-”

Piper’s going to lose her  _ fucking _ mind. It can’t mean that. It can’t and it won’t. He’s dead. He’s dead and he’s not coming back. He’s gone and burned, nothing but ashes on the wind. Burnt so quickly and so badly that his soul burnt up along with him. There’s nothing left but memories and the lingering feeling that someone is missing every day of your life. The hole in her soul, making her turn to make a joke to someone who isn’t there. It’s thinking ‘ _ wow, he’d love this movie’  _ but the being reminded that he can’t see that movie because he’s dead. 

Leo Valdez is dead, and nothing can change that. Not the gods, not Piper, not anyone. And trust her, she’s tried. 

Drew is still watching her as Piper stares emotionlessly at the wall across from her. Nico is opening and closing his mouth like a goldfish.  Percy is the only one brave enough to say anything. 

“The prophecy- it wants us to resurrect Leo”

  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kudos and comments, as always my dears, are appreciated and very much liked. even small stuff. or give me an entire essay on my shit writing skills, i don't care!


	5. the die is cast

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello my children. sorry for the late update but, quick psa, i can't keep my brain on track for the love of all thats good and holy, so i got...sidetracked. thank you all for the lovely comments that made me get my head in the game in regards to this story and i'm going to start taking it a little more seriously :)
> 
> also, some quick warnings regarding the story in general: there will be discussions of child abuse, child murder, discussions of underaged sex/drinking and drug-use so if that potentially triggers or upsets you, I'd say give this one a miss. there will be no hard feelings and I'd prefer if you keep your mental wellbeing above some fanfiction. right now, it's pretty tame, but those topics and some others will be coming up later in the story. and don't worry, i will be putting warnings in front of each chapter if they contain heavy/triggering material. 
> 
> also also, this story is an exploration of grief and death, mostly to help me vent some stuff in regards to death, so don't put yourself under unnecessary pressure if you feel like that could put you in a bad place. 
> 
> anyways, sorry for the monstrous author's note, but it's done now and here is my latest piece of monster-fueled 3 am ramblings my dudes :)

  
  


**CHAPTER V;**

**Camp Half-Blood, Long Island, NYC 21/12/13**

Any celebrations for the solstice are noticeably absent. 

For the past three years, they’ve held Campfires and feasts and mini-festivals to protect themselves from the dark, ancient powers of the 21st. Lit fires to chase away the darkness and celebrated to keep the dark feelings of an unseen evil away. 

It’s like Greek Halloween, in that way. Celebrating to hide their fears from the monsters and demons lurking in the forests and the dark. 

But today, Camp is slow. Quiet. People can’t hide from the foreboding night, with grief and confusion heavy in the air. 

Nico swipes at the practice dummy, again and again, spinning on his heel to cut an ‘x’ across the dummy’s chest. 

Straw falls out onto the sand floor of the Arena and Nico comes to a panting stop. He’s lost track of time in here and he doesn’t want to think. 

So he trains. 

His sword, the same one he’s had since he was 11, feels like it’s another part of him. A limb, almost. It doesn’t have a name, Nico never bothered with stuff like that, but some demigods did. Their weapons were important to them, worthy of names, but Nico’s never felt the need to name his sword. 

The Stygian Iron trembles with his emotions, black mist trying to leak from the metal in response to his jack-rabbiting heart. He clenches his left fist around the black leather of the hilt, turning his knuckles red with exertion, stark against his pale skin. 

( _ but beauty and death shall restore-) _

Shit. 

He rubs his right hand across his face roughly, digging his thumb and middle finger into the corner of his eyes. 

Nico hates this feeling of- helplessness, confusion, that hot, tight feeling that makes his chest burn and his breath come fast. 

He  _ needs  _ answers, and this prophecy has just made everything worse. It’s brought up more questions than answers and Nico fucking  _ hates _ not being in control. He’s not a control freak, but he’s never been comfortable with just-  _ going along _ with stuff. 

He takes a breath. He silences the screaming in his chest and head long enough to take inventory. 

He sits down, up against the dummy and drops his sword down beside him. 

Mysteriously sleeping children of Hephaestus. Olympus closing its gates so quickly that they left Dionysus out. His Father being completely unreachable, the same going for Persephone. His headaches. His powers not working  _ quite _ right. Rachel and Delphi. This all happening around the Winter Solstice. 

Leo. 

Nico hasn’t really thought about Leo in a while. Not in depth. He’s been dead for three years. Nico doesn’t have the time to mourn him anymore, and, anyway, dying young seemed to be the most natural course for demigods. 

The first few weeks after Leo died, Hazel, in trying to process her grief, tried to get in contact with the people he knew before Camp. Going through Leo’s old notebooks and tracking down people through other people. 

Nico helped because he wanted to help. He swears that was all there was to it. Anyway, how could he grieve someone who didn’t  _ like  _ him?

Hazel found a few who were willing to talk to her. Some of his old contacts refused to talk. Some didn’t give a shit. Some were dead. 

One said, high-pitched and Californian in nature, found in a New York youth homeless center with brown-hair dyed a bottle-blonde:

“ _ Well, shit, that was predictable”  _

One said, sitting behind plexiglass at Maryland Juvenile Detention Center, bright eyes downcast and a cruel turn to his mouth: 

“ _ What a fuckin’ waste” _

One laughed when she told him he had died. 

_ “Valdez, dead? Give it a week, and if he’s still ‘dead’, call me again. I just lost a bet” _

Nico’s had three years to come to terms with the fact that none of them knew Leo. Piper got the closest, but Valdez was like a bottomless pit of secrets. So much there that they just had to stop digging, leaving Leo’s legacy of secrets in the gloom. 

Nico’s had three years to come to terms with the fact that, at one point, between Hell and Epirus, that he had a crush on Leo Valdez. 

It was hard not to, after all. Valdez was  _ magnetic,  _ especially when he didn’t try to be. Quick grins and sharp eyes and long, thin fingers. He was at his best when he was sardonic, when he was too tired or pissed to keep up his act. When he smiled with his canines and eyes like embers from a fire that had just finished consuming an entire city. When Leo was vicious and uncontained and barely holding it together. 

He used to annoy Nico, too. On purpose, of course, teasing him and making jokes at his expense, but he did  _ care  _ about Nico. He thinks that might’ve been Leo’s way of making sure Nico could still get pissed, still get angry and frustrated. That Nico could still  _ feel _ , in some capacity. 

It was kind of sweet. 

Then, because no one was watching Leo closely enough, he kamikazed himself into Gaia and dropped thousands of feet into the Atlantic Ocean, killing himself instantly and burning up his own soul as fuel to kill Gaia. 

( _ but beauty and death shall restore his lost breath) _

Nico’s sure going around resurrecting people is a big no-no in his Father’s book. The last person to do that was  _ Aesclepius _ and that got him killed by Zeus. And Nico has no desire to go out like his Mother. 

This doesn’t bode well for them, especially since they only have  _ half a prophecy.  _ Prophecy’s when they’re said in full are confusing and misleading, but going on a quest with only half the instructions seems like a suicide quest. 

But it’s either that or watch Piper go on her own. Because she’s  _ going  _ on that quest, and not Olympians or Tartarus himself could stop her. Piper McLean will make the gods bend to her will if she has to and Nico is terrified that it might reach that point someday. 

And, because it’s Piper McLean on a quest to resurrect Leo Valdez, they’re leaving for the singular worst place on the earth. 

The Mojave Desert. 

The Land Without Rain. 

The term still sends shivers up his arms, but he’s kept his mouth shut, much to Percy’s dismay and worried glances. 

Nico chewed harder on his nails and Percy just sighed loudly, stalking away to his car to get his stuff from his apartment in New York. Despite Percy’s retirement, he seemed almost  _ excited  _ to go on this quest. Annabeth would probably voice her concerns and general ‘ _ that’s stupid, don’t do that _ ’ arguments, but Annabeth loved her boyfriend and she knew that Percy was intelligent enough to judge the danger himself.

He’s never been to where Bianca died. 

He tried to go, plenty of times, but it always proved too much for him. He could never get too far before devolving into a panic-attack so bad it affected him for weeks after.

He never told anyone, but Percy knew too much about him for Nico to hide much. Reyna’s dangerously close to seeing the cracks and Nico needs for her to not see what that means. She’d  _ freak  _ if Nico kept the secret and went anyways. Percy’s already on high-alert, and he loves Piper, but now the goal of the quest has been said, Nico could be dying from a stab wound and Piper would still be focused on the task. 

Nico sits on the arena floor for an untraceable amount of time, though he can’t tell how long he’s been here, he hears an  _ “ahem”  _ and the scuffling of feet.

He opens his eyes (he closed them?) to see 4 kids, around 14 years old and most of them looking at the ground, save for the kid who caught Nico’s attention. 

“ _ Ciao _ ,” he says, his voice gravelly from disuse and damage and the three kids jump. The front one, possibly a girl, judging by her long, brown hair and bright purple skort, scowls at him. 

“Can we use the Arena now, or are you going to keep sleeping here?” the front one asks, crossing her arms over her leather training armor. 

He raises an eyebrow and one of the kids starts muttering nervously in a language Nico doesn’t know to the lead kid, his eyes darting over to Nico every few seconds. 

He sighs, pushing himself up and feeling his body ache from the exercise, turning his sword back into its chain form and tying it around one of his belt loops. Nico’s tired and hungry and needs to get ready for tomorrow morning, no point hogging the Arena. 

“Sorry about that,” he says, brushing himself off as the kid watches him with dark blue eyes. “The place is all yours”

But, before he leaves, the girl, the boss of the group calls out to him. “Hey!” she calls, rushing in front of him, stopping him in his tracks. He’s so surprised that he has no other choice but to stop and stare down at her. 

She’s short, with dark, dark brown hair and dark skin. Her eyes are angular and dangerous, sparking with a challenge. “I’m Diah. You’re Nico Di Angelo. You’re going to wake Harley up, right?”

He stares down at the girl in silent bewilderment. “I...hope so- Are you, friends, with him or-”

She rolls her eyes and says something to a kid beside her. He’s taller than her, but he’s much less full-on. His hair is dark, inky black and his eyes are grey, indicating a child of Athena, but his skin is the same shade as the girls. He snaps something back and she throws her eyes up to the Heavens. 

“Hell no, hated Davidson, but my half-sister, Mentari, she knew Valdez, so if you don’t fix this, I have to”

He arches his eyebrow in shock. “Your sister...knew Leo?”

“Yeah,” he drawls carefully, like he’s slow, “They were in a home together and he helped her when she ran away, so I had to pay my debt to him. But apparently the ass died three years ago, so I’m left with his stupid brother, but I can’t re-pay my debt if all his siblings are in a coma. So fix it”

There...is certainly a lot to unpack in that statement. “Okay…?” he says, carefully backing up from the girl. He’s going to bet a lot on Daughter of Nike. Or Nemesis. “I’ll certainly try to do that”

“There is no try” she growls and her two other compatriots, two twin girls, with thick, curly, brown hair, giggle behind their weapons. 

“I’ll be watching, Di Angelo,” and Nico’s never quickly walked away from a 14-year-old faster. 

  
  
  


*~*

The rest of his day is filled with nothing, really. He talks with Rachel some more, but she’s clueless as to what the rest of the prophecy could be. He’s forced out after an hour by Will, but when he attempts to get a grasp on Rachel’s- tail, life-line, whatever you call it, it slips through his fingers uselessly. 

Right. Powers on the Fritz. How lovely. Just what Nico needs right now. 

When Will notices, he tries to get Nico to let him check him up, but Nico steadfastly refuses. Whatever is happening, Nico will  _ deal _ with it. It’s  _ his _ powers and he’ll find the solution. 

He tells Will that he isn’t Nico’s babysitter, which initiates a spat in the long, winding halls of the Big House. 

‘ _ I just want you healthy, for fuck’s sake-’ _

_ ‘You’re not my mother, Solace, stop acting like it-’ _

Shit, Nico misses him. Misses when things were easier, when Nico was happy and content to be in a relationship with Will. When things were soft and calm between them and Nico could hold his hand and smile into his kiss. 

But Nico isn’t 15 years old anymore. 

His mood noticeably sours after the argument and he eats dinner in silence at Table 13. Piper barely eats, pushing her pasta around on a plate and keeping quiet, her mind a thousand miles away as she sits across from him. 

Reyna doesn’t bother to attempt conversation, other than to inform them that the Romans have nothing on this prophecy. Not all the chicken entrails in Berkely seem to birth any result, and it sticks to Nico that Octavian’s actually using chickens. The guy hates blood, but he hates being in the dark about something more, apparently. 

She also informs them she’s coming on the Quest.  _ Fuck the Rule of Three _ , she says, this is a suicide mission anyway. The issue isn’t up for discussion and Nico smiles down at his dinner. He doesn’t miss the way Piper smiles too. 

The rest of the tables are much quieter, too. There’s a low mummer, but the emptiness of Table 9 is like a black-hole. The usually loud table, now barren. People can’t stop looking at it, like somehow, they’ll just appear there, awake and fine if they keep watching it. 

Nico looks at the bench. He looks sharply back down at his half-full dinner plate and stabs a piece of brisket violently. 

The fire burns low, the Soltice darkness seemingly endless, only barely kept out by the Barrier. The fleece seems like Camp’s only protection against thousands of monsters hidden under the blanket darkness. 

It makes Nico anxious. He’s not afraid, just-

It’s so  _ dark.  _

Dionysus seems sober, but he’s not drinking the wine publicly. Too much confusion for the other demigods. It would make them realize that they have all been abandoned, left alone against the dark. 

Percy, almost 7 hours later, comes back with a backpack, news that Olympus really is closed ( _ no one’s at the desk, the button’s disappeared too _ , he tells them around some takeaway Chinese noodles), and a flustered but determined Annabeth. 

It’s not a council meeting, thank the gods. It takes place in Nico’s Cabin, because his Cabin is now apparently Central Station. Him, Reyna, Piper, Percy, and Annabeth. 

“So,” Annabeth starts, sitting down beside a lying down Percy on the bed across from Nico’s. “ The Land without Rain, are we in agreement that’s-” her flint eyes dart over to Nico’s face her a second, “-that’s Hephaestus’ Scrapyard?”

“Sure, okay, but where is  _ that?  _ It’s in a desert, right?” Piper asks absentmindedly, looking into Kraptois’ bronze, clear blade from her place on Nico’s bed, the tips of her socked feet pressing into his thigh.

Reyna nods at her, dragging a hand through Piper’s long black hair, pulled free of its braid, “Yes, the Mojave to be particular. The Yard has a habit of moving, but due to its surplus of Imperial Gold and weapons, Rome has always kept an eye on it. It’s favored the Mojave, particularly the area around Death Valley in recent years. Low Mortal density and the distance from Olympus makes it a perfect area for the Gods’ dumping ground”

Death Valley, the hottest place in America, shit, that can’t be a coincidence. Coincidences don’t exist with them because it’s always, always Fate. 

Piper turns more fully into Reyna, burying her head in her stomach and mumbles something, too low for Nico to hear. Then, she says it again, louder this time. 

“He told me the last place he stayed long-term before Wilderness was Las Vegas,” and they all share a Look.

“If Leo had-” has? Is it  _ has  _ now? “- a connection to the Mojave, or even the Junkyard, it strengthens the theory that that’s where we need to go,” Annabeth says, tying her curls up in a ponytail as she talks. 

“What about  _ Garden City?  _ That’s a city, right, could be Vegas?”

Reyna snorts, cocking her eyebrow at Percy, “Yes, Jackson, the desert city of Las Vegas is the garden city, how quickly you’ve deduced this mystery”

He pouts at her, poking Annabeth in her side. “Babe, the mean lady is making fun of me”

“Please leave my boyfriend alone, Ramírez-Arellano”

“Fuck it,” Piper grumbles, pulling herself up, her dark hair spilling around her shoulders and down her back. “We know for a fact that his  _ breath  _ or whatever is in Nevada or Death Valley or something. I say we go to Vegas and figure it out from there”

Annabeth frowns her pattened  _ ‘im thinking’  _ frown, chewing on an escaped curl. 

“Well,” Percy says, stretching across the bed like a cat and shoving his feet into Annabeth’s lap. She looks unperturbed, “I’m on board with Piper’s idea. Quests usually work like that, kinda just pan out as you go along. I’m sure if we go to The Junkyard, shit’ll just start happening”

Annabeth’s frown deepens, furiously chewing on her own hair. “It doesn’t make sense, though-” and she trails off, looking somewhere off in the middle distance. 

They all wait for her to come back to herself before Percy rolls his eyes fondly and pokes her in the stomach with his toes, apparently impatient. “What doesn’t make sense, wise girl?”

“Everything,” Piper snorts and Nico lets himself grin a little bit. 

“Well,” Annabeth starts, shifting on the bed as she leans forward, “first of all, why mention two places? If Forge is in this  _ Garden City,  _ why would his breath be in the Junkyard? Why make the distinction? Also, something we haven’t talked about-”

“Ever-lurking death,” Percy mumbles, doing that weird almost-telepathy thing with Annabeth. “Sounds creepy. And all-around bad. Why hide in the shadow of your ever-lurking death? Sounds painful”

“Yes,” and Annabeth continues at break-neck speed, “What does it mean, exactly? If it was talking about the place where he actually died, it would be here, in Long Island, but it’s talking about the  _ shadow _ of his death, so, somewhere Leo almost died, but the  _ ever-lurking  _ part is what gets me”

“It’s easy,” Piper says, despite it not being easy at all, “We need to find a place where Leo almost died, but it fucked with him so badly he felt shadowed or haunted by it. That narrows it down to about few 40 places scattered across the country”

“Fuck”

Piper smiles up at his sigh, her liquor-dark eyes reflecting the warm light, almost hiding the dark bags and the traces of tears on her face and eyes. 

“Fuck is right, death-boy”

They stay talking for an hour or two more before turning in for sleep, quickly going over supplies and weapons for the morning. Percy and Annabeth elect to stay in Cabin 13, citing the dustiness of an unkept Cabin 3. They squeeze into a bed together, somehow, by some feat of entanglement and physics-defying. 

As a testament to how bone-weary she is, Piper doesn’t even wolf-whistle or make some suggestive comment at the couple. She just grins, filled with water and exhaustion, as she turns in silently for bed, burying herself into the mattress, pulling the quilt above her head. 

Reyna’s the last to clamber into bed, whispering goodnight to them all. 

Nico doesn’t even need an aid to help him sleep this time, because it’s like sleep has dug its claws into him and is dragging him down and down, forcing him under quicker than he can realize. 

He flounders for a few moments, as sleep demands his attention. It will not take no for an answer, not with his new neighbor waiting for him. 

* * *

**?? ???????, ??? ????** **/ ???? ???? ???? ????, ???????: ??** **/ ??** **/ ??**

  
  


Nico wakes up. 

….Or does he? He can’t really tell. 

It all feels very dreamlike. Not quite real. Just on the outskirts of reality, covered by soft clouds and confusing rules. Nico’s able to lucid dream, so this state is familiar, but the sharpness in the corners of this reality feel too... _ real.  _

He opens his eyes. 

This isn’t the room he fell asleep in. He blinks up at the white ceiling, green and grey mold gathering in circles. He turns his head, following a line of dampness and mold, to the left side of the room. It’s a door, wooden and heavy, but he has the sneaking suspicion that he’ll never be able to open it. A little to the right of the door is a desk, littered with candy wrappers and sketches of stuff he can’t quite make out. It looks just as damaged as the rest of the room, but it looks more loved. 

Nico’s never been in a dream that’s felt this  _ real  _ before. 

Shit, did he Travel again? He curses, pulling himself up onto his feet and he turns to survey the entire room. 

It’s small. Maybe it was once a bedroom for a child or teenager, but it’s abandoned. Rotting wood and smelling of old, stagnating water, intermixed with smoke. The floor beneath him is dark wood, in better condition than the walls or the desk and there’s a small window, looking out above a busy city street. It’s cracked open slightly, leaving in the screech of the city he doesn’t recognize. 

It’s summer, wherever this is. The trees are in full bloom and the almost-setting sun is bright gold against the clear darkening sky. 

He walks towards it, placing a hand against the hot glass and looking down to the alley below. Nico’s on the 4th, maybe 5th floor of this place, so he’s got a bird’s eye view of a hobo pissing against the wall of a dollar tree. 

“Gotta love the view, ammiright? Best view in the city, in my opinion,” and Nico spins around, reaching for a sword that’s not there, eyes wide and hunted, but Leo Valdez continues on, “After all, no other view can offer you the true nature of American society”

Leo shakes his head sadly, chewing on a twizzler, “After all, in the end, aren’t we all hobos pissing against the wall of the American Political System? Trying to bum a smoke off the country’s vast amount of millionaires and billionaires?”

Leo looks like he did three years ago. ‘ _ Of course he does _ ,’ snaps a part of Nico’s brain, ‘ _ he’s dead _ ’. He’s sitting on the previously unoccupied desk, half-bathed in the golden sunlight, swinging his legs. 

Nico realizes that he had forgotten parts of Leo. He stares at Leo, and Leo stares back, chewing dutifully on a new twizzler. Nico had forgotten the exact shape of his eyes, the exact color of brown, the way his curls brushed against the tips of his pointed ears. He had forgotten the pattern of the freckles spattered like dark paint against his forehead and cheeks. He had forgotten about the marks in his ears and his nose from his half-healed piercings. 

Leo’s still wearing the clothes they burned him in. A too-loose CHB shirt and distressed black jeans, his toolbelt strung haphazardly through the loops. 

Nico-

Nico- he-  _ what? _

This can’t be real. Can it? No, no this is a dream. A weird, fucked-up dream due to the prophecy and Leo Valdez is, for now, dead. 

The imposter smiles at him, his brown eyes sparking like a dangerous, exposed, damaged electrical wire. 

“What’s with the face, sixth sense? Looks like you’ve seen a ghost”

The phantom laughs at his own joke, but pouts when he realizes Nico isn’t laughing just-

Staring. 

“Aw, c’mon, death-breath,” he whines, kicking his legs, “Didn’t you get a sense of humor since 2010? Isn’t it boring not finding my brilliant jokes hilarious?”

Nico can’t stop staring at his dream-hallucination. He looks so real, so full of life. Nico’s almost amazed at his dreamscape for creating such a clear ghost. 

Leo’s mouth pulls into a thin line, all amusement falling from his face. He’s looking at Nico like he’s an unruly machine who won’t do its job. “Yo, di Angelo, you mind not staring at me like I’m the second coming?” and his voice is hard, serious, pissed off even. 

“I-” he tries, falling back against the window for support. The warm glass presses against his back, the frame digging into the muscles. His eyes are wide, dark and shocked, trying to comprehend how  _ real  _ Leo seems. Words seem beyond him, but Leo is looking tired of Nico’s open-mouthed confusion. 

He throws his eyes up to the heavens and jumps down from the desk, stretching his arms. “Let’s go, Di Angelo, use that big boy brain of yours to make some words, pretty please”

“You’re dead,”

Leo grins, rolling his eyes. “No shit, sherlock. I went  _ ka-boom,  _ remember? Really heroic and badass and everyone was like ‘ _ oh, Leo, he was so cool and was too handsome to die, but he saved us all!’  _ and I became some kind of cool, influential hero”

Something about Leo’s stupid voice talking about his death so casually, joking about the impact his death had, something dark bursts in Nico’s chest. The familiar anger helps settle him, gives him dry land to stand on, but the anger pushes away the fact that Nico’s supposed dreamscape hallucination is both aware of its own death and has opinions that make Nico angry. 

“You killed yourself and other people called it a brave sacrifice, Valdez. I wouldn’t call that heroic,” he hisses, pushing himself up away from the window. 

Leo, because he exists to fucking infuriate Nico, shrugs, like he’s saying ‘ _ well, what can you do?’  _ and starts on a new twizzler. “Well,” he says around the twizzler hanging out of his mouth, “I can’t control what people think when I’m,  _ y’know,  _ beyond the pearly gates. And I didn’t  _ kill myself,  _ jeez Di Angelo, keep that emo shit to yourself. I just knew what had to be done and I did it”

Nico’s going to kill him. Damn the fact that he’s already dead, Nico’s going to resurrect him and kill him again. 

“Fuck you, Valdez,” and Leo sticks his tongue up at him-

It takes Nico a few seconds to realize that he’s actually glowering over Leo. Three years ago, Leo still had an inch or two on Nico, but now, Leo has to look up at Nico. He had forgotten how small Leo used to be, around 5’6 to Nico’s now 5’10. 

He had forgotten-- a lot. 

But that happens, when people die, no matter how much you loved them, after a while, pieces of them drift away, forgotten. The exact shade of their irises and the exact shape of their mouth. You forget their voice, how they looked when they were happy or sad. You forget the worst bits of them and then, eventually, the best. Until all your left with is a few pictures, trying to spark your own memory of them, trying to unearth the pieces of them lodged in your brain. 

Nico’s forgotten a lot about Bianca. Too much, in his opinion. Forgotten her hands on his skin, the way she smiled when the sun broke through the clouds, the feeling of her silky black hair under his hands. Forgotten how she smelt, how she laughed. 

Nico’s older than Bianca will ever be and, fuck, it still hurts. 

The curse of the living is to forget the dead, the blessing of the dead is to forget the living. 

He reaches out, his hand shaking slightly, and presses his fingertips against Leo’s cheek. The flesh is soft, warm,  _ alive _ , under his fingers and Nico and it shifts with Leo’s shaky exhale, warm breath running across Nico’s hand. 

“What  _ are  _ you?” 

Leo blinks up at him, his eyes running through thousands of emotions in a millisecond. He opens his mouth, to answer, but nothing comes out. 

Nico drops his hand, his cool skin smoking slightly. It doesn't even hurt. It should.  Leo tries again, distress spreading across his face. Open. Close. His hands turn to determined fists at his side as he flounders, his eyes shiny with frustrated tears. His voice cracks with force as he tries to speak, but his confusion is evident. He looks terrified and lost, looking around the room as if for the first time, and then back down at his hands, watching them shake.

The city stays at sunset outside. The old man continues to piss against the dollar tree store. This place is caught in Time, and so are they.

He looks away from Nico when he admits, shakily,  _ “ _ I don’t know-I-I thought- _ ” _

His voice runs away again, but before Nico can help him or, he doesn't even know, do _something, _the entire room flickers, like reality is glitching out and Nico is falling again. 

Leo Valdez is left in the dark. Again

  
  


* * *

  
  
**Camp Half-Blood Borders, Long Island, NY; 22/12/13**

Piper doesn’t sleep the night after they get the quest. She doesn’t do much besides pack, come to think of it. 

Mitchell helps her pack some spare clothing and Piper feels like she’s 15 years old and her biggest worries were about her Dad’s attention and whether or not Jason Grace liked her.

At 19, those problems seem...small. No less pressing, she’s sure, but they seem so  _ juvenile _ now. Tiny in the face of Piper’s life now. 

Piper would kill people for the chance to go back on that Quest to save Hera. 

All she has now is a dysfunctional relationship with her ex-boyfriend, a crush on  _ his _ ex-girlfriend, a quasi-dead best friend, what Piper is  _ assuming _ is PTSD, the crippling fear of failure, existential dread, and a nicotine addiction. 

Oh, how far she’s come. 

Back then, she had so much. 

After the Quest, she liked to blame his death on why things were going badly. And, sure, yeah, her best-friend flinging himself thousands of feet into the Atlantic didn’t help things, but her and Jason breaking-up was a long time coming. The PTSD and the anxiety and insomnia were all by-products of being the progeny of a god and a child-solider. 

Leo’s death didn’t cause it, but it sure gave it a kick-start. 

leoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoleoe-

His name is like a curse that follows her.  _ Lion.  _ She found his full name while trying to get in contact with his mortal family and anything other than  _ Leo  _ feels- strange to her. His full name is too long, too clunky for him. 

She and Jason have matching tattoos. No couply ones, thank the gods for small mercies, but lions. It’s cheesy and stupid, but they were both 18 and it was meant to be Leo’s 18th that day, so they stumbled in drunk to a tattoo parlor and Piper pulled some strings. 

Jason had his placed right below his SPQR tattoo, which was now decorated in flowers of various meanings. Piper’s is on her outer forearm. The lions are identical, minimalist. It sits, stationary, unlike Leo, with thin black lines and a mane that looks like flames. 

It’s not her favorite tattoo. Her favorite is a simple  _ l.v  _ on her ribcage. It was a joke, originally between her and Leo and she was never able to let go of it 

( _ we should get matching tattoos, pipes _

_ of what, genius? it better be nothing corny or weird or i will hit you _

_ nah. we should get each other’s names. so if they find our bodies they’ll confuse us and i’ll get to be buried as piper mclean and have your hot dad mourn over my body- ow! don’t hit me!-) _

She shakes herself out of her own mind, continuing her trek up to Thalia’s pine. The sky is dark, the sun barely making its purple appearance over the line of the Atlantic. Her bag is light on her back, her dagger strapped to her belt and her eyes are hard. 

She will do this. If this prophecy will offer her a chance to bring Leo back, she’ll move heaven and hell to complete this stupid thing. 

The lion on her arm itches as the sun begins its rise behind her, golden light breaking up between the dark purples, rushing up to meet them all. She wonders if Apollo has it set to auto-pilot or something. 

They’re all waiting for her at the crest of the hill, all four of them. Annabeth is in sweats and Percy’s hoodie, her curls falling everywhere, but she looks no less serious, sunrise beginning to color her in harsh orange and gold. 

“Good luck,” she tells them all, dislodging herself from Percy’s grip to hug them all goodbye. She’s warm and soft and Piper tucks her  _ good luck  _ in between her heart and her lungs, breathing in her scent. 

She kisses Percy goodbye, and Piper can almost see the thread of fate tying them together. It’s soul-crushingly beautiful because there’s always the chance Piper might never find love like that. Might never find someone who looks at her and goes, _'this is the stupid bitch I wanna love forever'_

“Come back, okay?” she says and they all agree, but they all also know fate’s a bitch. Painfully, Percy seems to pull away from Annabeth and they all jog down the hill to where Percy’s car is parked, dew-wet, soggy grass brushing against Piper’s exposed ankles. They quickly load up, checking supplies and sliding into Percy’s car, anxiety bubbling up like lava in a volcano. Nico, weirdly enough, looks the worst out of all of them, like he hadn’t slept at all. 

He’s silent the entire morning, quietly settling into the shot-gun seat, lost in his own head. 

Piper and Reyna sit in the back and the middle seat between them feels like no-mans land. Dangerous and filled with uncertainty. They each keep to their own side and Piper pretends she doesn’t feel the sting.

Percy starts the engine, the entire car coming awake under her and Percy stares up at Annabeth’s form on the hill for a second, eyes unreadable. 

“ἀνερρίφθω κύβος,” Nico says quietly in the silence of the rumbling car and Percy huffs a laugh. Well, give it to Nico to not speak all morning and the first thing he says is an old Greek saying about fate. He’s so dramatic it hurts sometimes. 

Reyna sighs loudly, catching both Nico’s and Piper’s attention as Percy pulls onto the road. “Translation for the Roman?”

“Aw, Reyna,” Percy jokes, trying to pretend he’s not watching Annabeth’s form become smaller in the mirror, “Seriously? That phrase in the most roman thing I’ve ever heard Nico say. Julius Ceaser, all that hullabaloo?”

_ “Translation” _

“The die is cast,” Piper says, watching Long Island pass by through the slightly dirty window, following the powerlines, keeping herself alert and occupied, trying not to burst out of her own skin. 

_ The die is cast. _ Whatever happens now is in Fate’s hands, at least until Piper doesn’t get her way and has to ask Fate to step out of the fucking way so she can get her best friend back, because Piper may not be able to deal with her nightmares or anxiety or crippling self-doubt or ability to keep a relationship alive, but if she fixes this, fixes what happened to Leo, then maybe, just maybe-

Piper won’t feel so fucking broken. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank u for guiding ur eyes over my words and letting ur brain eat my words. please write some words of your own to make me feel nice and make some more words quicker. or just click the kudos button or bookmark button :)


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